Savannah rejects a project because it uses GPL

MJ Ray mjr at phonecoop.coop
Mon Feb 13 16:44:45 UTC 2006


"Alfred M\. Szmidt" <ams at gnu.org> [skip much]
> >  > Ok.  Then the sentence makes even less sense, since manuals are
> >  > not software, they cannot be classifed as "non-free software", or
> >  > "free software".
> 
> >  So, we agree they are not free software, but for different reasons.
> 
> To be precis, I'm not agreeing that they are not `free software'.
> They are simply not software, period.  Be it free, non-free,
> propietary, etc.  It is like calling a house for `non car', it isn't a
> car to begin with...

It is perfectly true to say that a house is not a petrol car,
if you don't think it's any sort of car.

> >  We should agree that debian is doing the right thing to uphold its
> >  promise of producing a 100% free software distribution and not
> >  apply higher standards to debian.org than gnu.org. The dispute is
> >  really that some want debian to change its promise, but that's
> >  happened for years, in different ways.
> 
> Since Debian is not upholding that promise, I cannot agree with this.
> I wish I could.

Debian delivers on its promise:
To get a 100% free software distribution from debian, get the
official distribution by download or from any of the places
listed on www.debian.org.

You can't get a 100% free software distribution from GNU today.

> >  Would you praise debian if ftp.debian.org pointed at a mirror that
> >  doesn't carry any non-free software?
> 
> Does or does not ftp.debian.org carry non-free software? Does or does
> not ftp.gnu.org carry non-free software?
> 
> Clearly, the answer is `Yes. No'.  You are jumping into the realm of
> itsy bitsy semantics.

Nonsense. You're playing silly DNS configuration games.
ftp.debian.org (aka debian-mirror.cs.umn.edu) and ftp.gnu.org are
not equivalent. If you compared that debian mirror with the main
GNU mirror (ibiblio), you'd see that both carry non-free software.

-- 
MJ Ray - personal email, see http://mjr.towers.org.uk/email.html
Work: http://www.ttllp.co.uk/  irc.oftc.net/slef  Jabber/SIP ask




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