discuss: Adverts on LDP mirrors
Subject:
Re: [discuss] Adverts on LDP mirrors
From:
David Lawyer ####@####.####
Date:
29 Nov 2008 06:35:41 +0000
Message-Id: <4930E27E.8080805@lafn.org>
Rick Moen wrote:
> Quoting Mail Lists ####@####.####
>
>> Hello all,
>> what is the position with regard to advertsing on LDP mirrors?
I think that most mirrors have no ads but for snapshots, most do have ads
and sometimes they are animated, etc. and interfere with reading the
documentation.
>
> Allister, good question. I suspect this is one of the reasons LDP
> licensing has always been an area of diverse views. (I was going to say
> "contention", but that's not exactly right: Licensing of non-software
> works is a difficult subject that has been characterised by very diverse
> views, problems that weren't anticipated, and a shortage of overall,
> enforced policy.)
>
> Some LDP people really rather dislike the common practice of putting a
> mirror up of free-licensed content, with nothing added in substantive
> content, but milking that content for advertising revenues from ads
> placed on the same pages. It seems tawdry and parasitic, and a desire
> to prevent that practice has often been expressed. On the other hand,
> any truly free / open source license (by criteria of either OSD or DFSG
> or Stallman's Four Freedoms Essay; take your pick) includes the right of
> commercial use. So, you _cannot_ ban advertising without rendering the
> thus-licensed content non-free / proprietary by definition.
Well, it depends on how one defines freedom. I pointed out the ad problem
to Stallman and he had sympathy for the problem but didn't change his
definition of free software. The problem is not as bad as it was formerly
since it seems that the Google search engine, etc. now seems to give a
higher rating to mirror sites or the docs there than to sites with ads (and
often very stale docs).
Isn't it freedom to be able to read a free doc without interference from
ads? I think we need a new definition of free documentation to allow
prohibition of displaying it with annoying advertising. A non-obtrusive
link or two to sponsoring commercial sites could be permitted. One could
write a license that would include the freedom of insuring that docs can be
read without pesky advertising but I don't think it's been done.
