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Re: Anton's amendment



On Wed, 1 Feb 2006 11:13:05 -0700, Wesley J Landaker <wjl@icecavern.net> said: 

> On Wednesday 01 February 2006 09:41, Manoj Srivastava wrote:
>> "The license must permit modifications". No if, and, or buts. So
>> no, I do not think that is actually true.

> Sure, it says it must permit modifications, but it doesn't way that
> it must permit ALL modifications. The way it reads, literally, could
> be interpreted as it must permit ALL modifcations, or as it must
> permit at least two modifications (so that "modifications" is
> plural).

        Nice hair splitting. But "The license must permit
 modifications"  would nominally be interpreted to mean modifications
 are permitted. Period. So far, I am not swayed by this line of
 argument. 

> Anyway, you, or I, or anyone can go on and on about nitpicking what
> it says and what is or is not an "interpretation", but all of that
> is pointless, since the Debian Free Software Guidelines are, well,
> guidelines.

> I think it's completely appropriate for the developer body to
> determine how to apply those guidelines using their own common sense
> and gut feel, without resorting to grammatical nitpicking. So a vote
> on this doesn't require any changes to what the document says, nor
> does it change what the document means. It's merely showing what how
> majority of developers think the guideliens should be applied to the
> GFDL.

        I beg to differ. There is a reason the foundation docuyments
 have a 3:1 modification requirement: If a simple majority were
 enough to "interpret" codicils on a novel and unconvetional fashion,
 then there is no point of the constitutional requirement for super
 majority.

        manoj
-- 
PARDON me, am I speaking ENGLISH?
Manoj Srivastava   <srivasta@debian.org>  <http://www.debian.org/%7Esrivasta/>
1024D/BF24424C print 4966 F272 D093 B493 410B  924B 21BA DABB BF24 424C



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