does a free license make software free?

Ciaran O'Riordan ciaran at fsfe.org
Wed Aug 29 10:17:42 UTC 2007


Hi Chrysn,

Ben's explanation is accurate, and from looking at their website it seems
that they never distribute source code, so people who use this software do
not have the necessary freedoms for it to be free software.

Also, for anyone interested in contributing to Wikipedia's coverage of free
software topics there is WikiProject_Free_Software which has todo lists
where you can find or add tasks:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:WPFS

And the free software portal presents the existing content:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Free_software


Chrysn <chrysn at fsfe.org> writes:
> as far as i know (or read [3]), the apache license is a non-viral free
> software license

A small point: All free software licences are non-viral.  Software will
never turn into GPL'd software just by touching software that is under the
GPL.  The GPL is a copyleft or "reciprocal" licence.


-- 
CiarĂ¡n 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



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