What is free software? [Re: Licenses and Open Source don't conflict.]

François Pinard pinard at iro.umontreal.ca
Fri Apr 12 22:48:51 EDT 2002


> > Public domain software is [...] a
> > special case of non-copylefted free software, [...]

[Jeff Shannon]

> Which *does*, in fact, mean that it is free software.  Unless perhaps
> free software means something other than free software?

There are many definitions of free software, and some people fight over
which definition is the real one.  Some even want monopoly of freedom! :-)

How I understand the GPL is that a software is not free, if it can be
used to create a bound between parties, in such a way that one of the
parties has lost part of its freedom on that software through that bound,
in particular the freedom to modify the software and/or share it around.

A public domain software can be modified by anyone, and the result can be
made available to someone else under a binding license.  So, that software
was indeed free, but that quality of being "free" was totally fragile...

The GPL wants to help programs at being free in more permanent ways.

-- 
François Pinard   http://www.iro.umontreal.ca/~pinard





More information about the Python-list mailing list