Re: call for seconds: on firmware

[Ben Finney <ben+debian@benfinney.id.au>]

Pierre Habouzit <madcoder@debian.org> writes:

> On Sun, Nov 16, 2008 at 09:01:38PM +0000, Manoj Srivastava wrote:
> >         The SC is pretty clear about everything in the Debian
> >  system (which includes image .debs) should be 100% free. Not just
> >  things in the Debian system that run on a host CPU (what is that,
> >  anyway) are free.
> 
> The SC speaks about software, and doesn't define it.

The statement that Manoj refers to, above, does *not* speak about
software.

    1. Debian will remain 100% free
       We provide the guidelines that we use to determine if a work is
       "free" in the document entitled "The Debian Free Software
       Guidelines". We promise that the Debian system and all its
       components will be free according to these guidelines. We will
       support people who create or use both free and non-free works on
       Debian. We will never make the system require the use of a non-free
       component.

There is no need to define “software” for this promise to be
understood. It explicitly promises that “the Debian system and all
its components will be free”.

> Firmwares are not going to disappear anytime soon, and playing that
> game for each release is destroying us from the inside.

So long as firmware is included in “the Debian system and all its
components”, it is covered by the above promise.

-- 
 \      “It takes a big man to cry, but it takes a bigger man to laugh |
  `\                                        at that man.” —Jack Handey |
_o__)                                                                  |
Ben Finney