[Mailman-Developers] GNU GIF problems - was [ANNOUNCE] Mailman 1.0rc1

[Benjamin B. Thomas]

bwarsaw@python.org writes: 

<snip>

> ...this will be the final 1.0 release.  
> The next step is to create the GNU web pages. 

<snip>

>  Mailman will now display Dragon's small logo on (most) generated
>  pages; 

<snip>

>  You need to read the instructions in the INSTALL file for putting
>  mailman.gif in a place...
           ^^^

Hi there! Since Mailman is a GNU project, won't there be problems if it makes 
heavy use of GIFs? I personally do not care if GIFs are used or not, but I 
suspect that Stallman will be quite displeased if Mailman itself or the Mailman 
pages at the GNU site use GIFs. I just wanted to point this out before too much 
work was invested. 

From http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/gif.html

> There are no GIFs on the GNU web site because of the patents (Unisys and IBM) 
> covering the LZW compression algorithm which is used in making GIF files. 
> These patents make it impossible to have free software to generate proper 
> GIFs. They also apply to the compress program, which is why GNU does not use 
> it or its format. 

Cheers,
benjy

1975 Cahaba Valley Road                                         (205) 988-4268
Indian Springs, AL 35124                                    benjy@alum.mit.edu