Still no new license -- but draft text available

[John W. Stevens]

Grant Griffin wrote:
> 
> So why doesn't he like it?--heck, he probably even wrote it himself!  Well, it
> turns out that its "copyleft" legal virus doesn't infect _other_ software that
> the user links with the LGPL'ed library (er, I mean "Lesser"); it only applies
> to modules of the original Lesser.  Fortunately, that isn't a severe loss of
> freedom to the user, it merely causes users a certain amount of trouble if one
> makes changes (so one quickly learns not to.)  But likewise, it really doesn't
> accomplish much of The Good Work of infecting software with Copyleft, so Mr.
> Stallman would have us abandon it in favor of the "GNU Public License".  (Hey,
> waitaminute!  Shouldn't that be the "Greater Public License"?!)

The kind of spin you put on this whole thing was why I responded.  I can
see that you remain unconvinced.

> >The GPL is not as some have painted it to be.
> 
> Perhaps.  But fortunately, the GNU web site and the writings of Richard Stallman
> make the intent of the GPL, and (to a lesser extent) the LGPL very, very clear.
> Here's a quote from http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/copyleft.html"

If you read the whole thing, you can see that no where does the word
"infect" occur.

> "In the GNU project, our aim is to give all users the freedom to redistribute
> and change GNU software.

Exactly.  "GNU software".  Not: "To infect closed source software".

> If middlemen could strip off the freedom, we might
> have many users, but those users would not have freedom.

Indeed . . . how many times have you heard the phrase: "Our customers
use Word, so we *HAVE* to".

He pretty much hit it right on the head: a loss of freedom.

> So instead of putting
> GNU software in the public domain, we ``copyleft'' it. Copyleft says that
> anyone who redistributes the software, with or without changes, *must* <emphasis
> added> pass along the freedom to further copy and change it. Copyleft guarantees
> that every user has freedom."

I trust you will note a complete absence of the word "infect" in the
above paragraph?

> 'must'-is-not-a-convincing-euphemism-for-'freedom'-any-more-than
>    'lesser'-is-a-convincing-euphemism-for-'library'-ly y'rs,

Must is not a euphism for freedom for the indivdual.  However, 'must' is
a *requirement* in guaranteeing freedom to the community.

As in "You must not steal/kill/covet, etc."

After all, the bill of rights is simply a list of must not's.

If you disagree, please describe a *free* community to me that has no
MUST.

-- 

If I spoke for HP --- there probably wouldn't BE an HP!

John Stevens
jstevens at basho.fc.hp.com