discuss: Re: [Fwd: Re: LSM in Bordeaux]
Subject:
Re: [Fwd: Re: LSM in Bordeaux]
From:
Rick Moen ####@####.####
Date:
14 Jul 2004 20:38:48 -0000
Message-Id: <20040714203841.GP31239@linuxmafia.com>
Quoting David Lawyer ####@####.####
> I'm sorry to hear that the DFSG still exists. A free license needs to
> be restrictive to those who would like to abuse it. A free license must
> restrict the license under which any modified work is issued.
Your definition of "free license" excludes both BSD licences, the MIT
X11 licence, the Apache licence, and all other non-copyleft free
licences -- basically _defining outside the concept_ about half the free
software in existence.
Listen LDP core volunteers: I'm sorry I have a difficult time treating
David's posts on licensing with respect, but honestly, this guy has no
business representing LDP on the subject, and it's truly appalling that
a person who is blatantly a licensing crank, and who (as past
discussions have shown) doesn't even understand basic copyright law, has
somehow defaulted to that role, as he represents you on the subject
exceedingly poorly.
I get the feeling he's your (alleged) licensing expert for no better
reason than the fact that he's interested in the subject and the rest of
you would rather not deal with it. Well, you can and should do better.
> Otherwise one could modify the work and issue a very non-free license
> for the modified work.
The above observation is true but completely fails to support your
conclusion: The public's ability to create non-free forks _of_ a work
doesn't make the work itself non-free.
> DFSG is flawed because it lists the things which a license may not
> restrict.
Feel welcome to post a suggested relacement to debian-legal. However:
> For example, suppose the license is null (contains only the sentence
> "have a nice day" etc.). Then one could claim that this license
> doesn't restrict anything.
To claim that would be to miss the point and attempt to play with words:
Since the licence (which in effect would be the default licence inherent
in copyright law, plus the additional phrase "Have a nice day") would
then fail DFSG #1, #2, #3, and #4, it would be extremely far from
DFSG-compliant.
Equivalant to your argument -- and equivalently devoid of merit -- would
be a claim that DJBware packages with no explicit licence statement are
DFSG-free because they "have no restrictions". That argument was
soundly and definitively rejected many years ago, for amply documented
reasons.
> However, to clarify matters and be unambiguous, DFSG should state the
> rights that the license must grant to overcome the restrictions of
> copyright law.
The reason this is not necessary is that it's assumed that intelligent
people of goodwill will be interpreting it, not timewasters devoid of
perspective.
> The other problems it fails to address is that of adding advertising to
> documents and maintaining (more precisely not maintaining) websites with
> unreasonably stale documentation (like 10 years out-of-date) which is
> not labeled as such.
This is not a licensing issue. (DFSG doesn't address the problem of
bad-tasting coffee, either.)
> The above problems are important for documentation and not very
> significant for software. It's also a shame that the Open Source
> Definition (TM) just used DFSG.
Feel welcome to do better. I won't be holding my breath, waiting.
--
Cheers,
Rick Moen "vi is my shepherd; I shall not font."
####@####.#### -- Psalm 0.1 beta
