This guest column by a representative of the Free Software Foundation Europe discusses proposed provisions in a future version 3 of the GNU General Public License that are intended to reduce open-source license proliferation, by making the GPL more flexible.
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Member since:2006-07-30
"Releasing the best possible GPLv3 next year and encouraging its adoption is on a far shorter time scale than grassroots lobbying with precious few dollars."
Agreed. Puts me in a tough situation somehow, since I'm usually an advocate of "worse is better" myself.
First of all I don't believe that v3 will ever gain significant traction within the open source community.
Even if it was perfect it would still have a hard time because many people don't like it.
If it helps to make people become aware of the problem it's useful nevertheless.
If we cannot stop them lobbying we probably need to start lobbying.
I'm so sick of this vicious circle:
People don't care because they think they have no power
and they have no power because they don't care.
If you somehow got enough voters/buyers gathered you could really scare the sh*t out of politicians/companies.
Let's just hope the majority is not too dumb to realize this.
So I guess what I'm saying is:
There is no short term solution but this problem is worth more than just a short effort.
Member since:2006-08-26
I can understand the pessimism you express, but I have been pleasantly surprised by how gung-ho people like Moglen are. The dude gets in the middle of many disputes and disagreements and just bobs up and asks for more. One does not have to agree with any point the guy makes to be impressed with the enthusiasm in the recordings of his various presentations.
Although adoption of GPLv3 is not to be taken for granted, there will be the wholesale adoption of the toolchain along with most if not all of the other GNU projects. Moreover, "GPLv2 only" is greatly outweighed by "or later", so it is not evident that the great majority of devs don't like it. Indeed, way too many people fail to see that among the few "GPLv2 only" cases, this choice frequently is just an ordinary business precaution with licenses that do not yet exist, such as GPLv3.
On the other hand, everyone knows that the kernel devs cannot change licenses easily if at all, so it is very easy for them to use their disproportionate influence to push their own choices. Most people who agree with them seem to either (1) believe, in effect, that allowing DRM to be forced on people matters more than "Freedom 1", or (2) put more stock on who says something rather than what is said.
People choose the GPL for the freedoms it protects, so what good is GPLv2 with the kind of crap pulled by Tivo, Novell/MSFT, etc.? (Those who mention legality totally miss the point.) GPLv2 becomes legal swiss cheese, protecting less and less, and naturally leads to the consideration of GPLv3.
Edited 2006-11-11 18:45
Member since:
2006-08-26
OK, given the intractability of creating public awareness and your belief that the GPL is the wrong solution, what is the right solution?
What about the urgency of the problem? Releasing the best possible GPLv3 next year and encouraging its adoption is on a far shorter time scale than grassroots lobbying with precious few dollars.