Discussion September 2007

discussion@lists.fsfe.org

29 participants
19 discussions

Re: does a free license make software free?
by Diogo Santos 17 Oct '07

17 Oct '07

> ps: i have not modified the wp article yet as of awaiting the outcome of > this thread, but describing core force as Free software is definitely > wrong (contradicting the preconditions of freedom #1) lman/listinfo/discussion FSF considers Apache License 2.0 a Free Software License. I consider that Apache license (and others), can be used in Free Software. But due too it's weaknesses, using Apache License to license the software, isn't by itself enough to consider the software under that license to be Free Software. Maybe FSF sees it also this way, but calls it a Free Software licence, to simplify. Does anyone from FSF wants to comment this? Is this it? I belive that althoug not intentional this is misleading. Maybe FSF should say that Apache License (and other similar in that terms), maybe used to license software copyrights, of Free Software, but isn't enough to consider it Free Software. «Free software is a matter of the users' freedom to run, copy, distribute, study, change and improve the software.» So maybe Free Software isn't just about copyright licensing, but also about author practices that may actually grant that freedom. with my cumpliments Diogo Santos --

9 13

Re: Discussion Digest, Vol 57, Issue 17
by Máté Gergely 03 Oct '07

03 Oct '07

> From: MJ Ray <mjr(a)phonecoop.coop> > I already posted three squirrelmail-using web mail providers! > > There's http://www.ippimail.com/ (ad-supported) http://altern.org/ > (AKA 3615 INTERNET, supported by sales of extra services) and > http://www.phonecoop.coop/ (paid accounts, I'm agent AG471). I'm > pretty sure all three use well-known free software on the backend too. > > Hope this reaches you this time! Hi! I wonder why it matters if the backend is free software or not. It's a service, and the free software backed can be tweaked any way the service owner wants to. This also applies to the squirellmail frontend: the hoster tweaks it. The end-user don't. I'm also sure that there are large portions of Gmail that are open source. Probably all the servers run Apache. Google is well known for using a lot of Python: free software. They provide a service backed by free software. The amount of the tweaking is the only different. And probably the amount of support of free software. Regards: Gery Mate

3 4

Free software and priorities?
by Carsten Agger 29 Sep '07

29 Sep '07

Hi all, I was reading an interview with RMS on ZNet (http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?ItemID=9350), and at one point the interviewer poses a question which is interesting, in many ways: "How would you respond to those who suggest that free software activists lack a sense of proportion? Given the vast scale and suffering of war, invasions, occupations, poverty, doesn't the freedom to use computers pale to insignificance?" My own background before being interested in free software was that of social activism, and one thing is definitely true: Free software may be a prerequisite for a free society, but does not in and of itself guarantee a free society. Corporations and states might give us free software while tying our hands in other ways, and we might want to work against wars, censorship, corporate domination of the media and of the media agenda, etc., before working for software freedom. So is software freedom the wrong place to put the emphasis in the light of all the other problems we might fight, or might it be? best regards Carsten -- http://www.modspil.dk - fordi tiden kræver et MODSPIL!

11 17

Groklaw article: Microsoft, antitrust and innovation
by Georg C. F. Greve 28 Sep '07

28 Sep '07

Hi all, for your information, an article of myself just went up on Groklaw, which points out some of the fallacies spread by Microsoft after the antitrust ruling last week, and also explains the connection to OOXML. See http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20070923170905803 for more information. Regards, Georg -- Georg C. F. Greve <greve(a)fsfeurope.org> Free Software Foundation Europe (http://fsfeurope.org) Join the Fellowship and protect your freedom! (http://www.fsfe.org) What everyone should know about DRM (http://DRM.info)

3 2

About moral rights
by lolo 27 Sep '07

27 Sep '07

i don't know if they already cover the 'need of' maintaining invariant sections, ded. and ack.(fdl) and to have to create another license(sfdl). have a quick look: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moral_rights

2 1

Re: Apache License and LGPL (v2/3)
by chrysn 27 Sep '07

27 Sep '07

hello reinout, hello discussion list (whom i ask to intervene if i'm mistaken in my explanations), > A few weeks ago you posted a helpful comment on the Epiphany mailinglist > about Free software licenses. > > I was hoping you could do the same for this discussion I'm currently > involved in: > http://www.nabble.com/Calling-all-translators---UrlValidator-translation-tf… what i can say for sure is that from a GNU (gettext) point of view, it is definitely ok for apache licensed software (in fact, for every software) to *use* gettext -- that's what the LGPL is intended for. it is definitely not a GPLv3 issue either: the GPLv3 was, among other things, designed to allow merging of Apache licensed code with GPL'd code resulting in a new GPL project, not vice versa. (the "or later" clause would be safe to use, but does not help you in that case.) i am not familiar with the apache proceedings, but from what i read in the thread, wicket is an apache project, and thus, the apache foundation might place arbitrary limitations on what they are allowed to include. [1] clearly states that LGPL is not ok for them. in my opinion (and, i guess, also the opinion of the GNU people; see the GNU statement on LGPL and java [2]), they misinterpret the LGPL, but i can't help it. (it might be required that a LGPL'd jar wrapper is created around gettext, which i assume to already have happened, but apache people seem to still refuse inclusion.) i suggest you look for an existing java-style framework that does for java what gettext does for c and python, as i don't assume the apache position will change any time soon. considering the size of the apache java code base, i bet there is already an existing framework you can plug into. hth chrysn [1] http://wiki.apache.org/jakarta/Using_LGPL'd_code [2] http://www.gnu.org/licenses/lgpl-java.html

1 0

Open Data Commons - Licence now out
by MJ Ray 26 Sep '07

26 Sep '07

One problem caused by Europe for free software is database licensing, which isn't quite the same as copyright over databases. Someone has published a first draft of an open data licence to try to cover this. Is this useful for free software or not? Introduction: http://www.opencontentlawyer.com/2007/09/24/open-data-commons-licence-now-o… Draft: http://www.opencontentlawyer.com/open-data/open-database-licence/ Discussion list: http://lists.opencontentlawyer.com/listinfo.cgi/tcl-discuss-opencontentlawy… I'm slightly concerned about the triple-whammy of database licensing, copyright licensing and a contract. I'm very happy to see the confusing CC-style anti-TPM wording made irrelevant by permitting parallel distribution. There's also an Open Data Factual Info Licence which puzzles me a bit because *information* is not covered by copyright, only the expression (the licence also seems to state this in point 2.4), so it seems a bit unnecessary. Please comment on the owner's site and/or here. I'll try to link the two in a few minutes. Thanks in advance, -- MJ Ray http://mjr.towers.org.uk/email.html tel:+844-4437-237 - Webmaster-developer, statistician, sysadmin, online shop builder, consumer and workers co-operative member http://www.ttllp.co.uk/ - Writing on koha, debian, sat TV, Kewstoke http://mjr.towers.org.uk/

3 3

Five days left: Submit your Free Software projects to the Trophees du Libre
by Georg C. F. Greve 25 Sep '07

25 Sep '07

[feel free to forward] Hi all, allow me to send a reminder that there are five days left to submit your projects to the Trophees du Libre http://www.tropheesdulibre.org/?lang=en Please also see http://www.fsfe.org/fellows/greve/freedom_bits/submit_your_free_software_pr… http://www.fsfe.org/fellows/greve/freedom_bits/so_this_is_what_hit_microsoft for more information. The Trophees du Libre is a very interesting award with special focus on the unknown, new and innovative, although established projects can also be elegible. So if you have (or know) a really cool project, make sure they have applied. Best regards, Georg -- Georg C. F. Greve <greve(a)fsfeurope.org> Free Software Foundation Europe (http://fsfeurope.org) Join the Fellowship and protect your freedom! (http://www.fsfe.org) What everyone should know about DRM (http://DRM.info)

1 0

CeMAP certificate the financial training academy
by The Financial Training Academy 24 Sep '07

24 Sep '07

http://www.ftacademy.co.uk/ CeMAP certificate CeMAP course CeMAP course in London CeMAP course London CeMAP courses CeMAP financial advisors CeMAP financial advisor CeMAP financial qualification CeMAP financial qualifications CeMAP intensive course CeMAP intensive courses CeMAP intensive training CeMAP intensive training course CeMAP intensive training courses CeMAP London CeMAP financial advisor training CeMAP financial courses CeMAP financial training CeMAP mortgage advisor CeMAP mortgage advisors CeMAP nvq CeMAP nvq course CeMAP nvq training CeMAP Our primary course delivery concentrates on two specific and fundamental courses required for anyone wanting to become a competent mortgage advisor. ____________________________________________________________________________________ Catch up on fall's hot new shows on Yahoo! TV. Watch previews, get listings, and more! http://tv.yahoo.com/collections/3658

1 0

FSFE & Samba anti-trust interview
by Ciaran O'Riordan 20 Sep '07

20 Sep '07

Sean Daly was in Luxembourg for Monday's anti-trust ruling and managed to get a group interview with Carlo Piana and Georg Greve of FSFE and Jeremy Allison and Volker Lendecke of Samba: http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20070919214307459 I think it turned out well, and there are interesting stories there that all the journalists missed - like the 3.6 billion that Microsoft spent to buy off others (while feigning pain about the 430 million fine), etc. Worth a read/listen IMO. And you can vote for it on digg here: http://digg.com/microsoft/Want_to_meet_four_men_who_dared_to_fight_MS_and_w… -- Ciarán O'Riordan __________________ \ http://fsfeurope.org/projects/gplv3 http://ciaran.compsoc.com/ _________ \ GPLv3 and other work supported by http://fsfe.org/fellows/ciaran/weblog \ Fellowship: http://www.fsfe.org

1 0

2024

2023

2022

2021

2020

2019

2018

2017

2016

2015

2014

2013

2012

2011

2010

2009

2008

2007

2006

2005

2004

2003

2002

2001

2000

Discussion September 2007