Greg Kroah-Hartman's announcement for free Linux driver development included the necesssary legal framework to honor NDAs when creating GPL'd drivers. This allowance was discussed on the OpenBSD -misc mailing list. In a public exchange with Greg KH, Stephan Rickauer said: "Now these companies have a great excuse to keep specs locked up tight under NDA, while pretending to be 'open'. The OpenBSD project has made clear more than once how this will hurt Free Software in the long run. Signing NDA's ensures that Linux gets a working driver, sure, but the internals are indistinguishable from magic. It is a source code version of a blob." OpenBSD founder Theo de Raadt called the free driver effort a farce, "you are trying to make sure that maintainers of code - i.e. any random joe who wants to improve the code in the future - has less access to docs later on because someone signed an NDA to write it in the first place. You are making a very big mistake."
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Member since:2006-02-15
But one can be incorporated into code that is then made un-free, therefore allowing the decrease of the freedom of users, while increasing the freedom of developers.
And that safe incorporation into proprietary code can lead companies, such as mine, to donate a lot of code back, as an act of good citizenship for not having to worry about gpl infection of our intellectual property.
That's what I mean when I say that one isn't freer than the other, because it depend whose freedom you're talking about. They are both free, in different way. Trying to quantify that amount of freedom is a fruitless exercise.
It is difficult to quantify. But as someone who has contributed significant chunks of code into both worlds and who has had to justify the investement in doing that to corporate management, I'll come down on the "BSD is freer" side.
It has never seemed to me that BSD license versus GPL is a matter of user versus developer freedom. Rather, it seems like a matter of which sort of developer is shackled. The users tend to benefit about the same from either license. It's the corporate programmer who can't use GPL-ed code in closed source, and only that programmer who loses in either case.
Member since:2005-07-02
And that safe incorporation into proprietary code can lead companies, such as mine, to donate a lot of code back, as an act of good citizenship for not having to worry about gpl infection of our intellectual property.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not actually taking sides in the debate, just noting that both can be considered freer depending on the philosophical context, and therefore it's just simpler to say that they are both free, but differently.
It is difficult to quantify. But as someone who has contributed significant chunks of code into both worlds and who has had to justify the investement in doing that to corporate management, I'll come down on the "BSD is freer" side.
Of course, because you're considering this from the developer's point of view, therefore your perspective on freedom is different than someone who only sees it as a user.
The users tend to benefit about the same from either license.
Only if you consider the actual licensed code, but *not* its potential derivatives. Once you factor in derivatives (and you *have* to, since that is after all what the licenses are about), then BSD does not promote the user's freedom quite as much though it offers developer more freedom. So while derivatives of GPLed code are guaranteed to remain free for users to redistribute, derivatives of BSD code are not.
It's an interesting argument, anyway, and is reminescent of an interesting debate about the nature of democracy: do you allow for people to elect totalitarian parties, i.e. parties that will then abolish the democratic regime... If you don't, then it's not real democracy, because the will of the people is restricted in some way. And if you do...well, you end up with Nazi Germany, born out of the ultra-democratic Weimar republic.
Limiting freedom in order to guarantee it does sound Orwellian, but the argument in favor of it *can* be made. Anyway, I don't expect us to agree on this, but at least I didn't wonder if you were confused or stupid... ;-)
Edited 2007-02-17 06:07
Member since:2005-07-02
One cannot propigate altruism, it is no longer altruism when you are forced into it.
You are not forced into it. You agree to it when you use the license.
But the licence is not altruism, as I have said, it is reciprocation.
And I argue that it is both.
How code is used does not effect how free it is, the restrictions imposed upon it's usage does.
Licenses are not concerned with how the code is used; they only matter when it is redistributed.
Implying that only the goals and opinions of the FSF and thus RMS matter is trolling, no matter how it is said.
I saw no such implication, though you clearly inferred this.
I could not give a shit how one feels about vulgarity, shit, goddamn, cocksucker, motherf--ker, c*nt, ass.
That only shows your lack of maturity and debating skills. I guess you don't care about your posts being buried either. Keep it up, kid, and you might even get banned.
Edited 2007-02-17 18:04
Member since:
2005-07-02
If you don't understand how the GPL functions, feel free to read over it, the viral effect is a feature of the licence, it's the purpose of it the licence. Any BSD code that enters GPL code becomes GPL code, and GPL code that enters BSD code turns the code GPL, it's quite simple, that's how a viral infection works, it spreads into everything it has contact with.
"Entering" and "coming in contact with" are two different things. The second expression, which is the one you used in your previous post, is deliberately inflammatory, just as comparing it to a virus is. When GCC compiles code, it certainly "comes in contact with it", but it doesn't make the code GPLed. When a BSD library is used by a GPLed program, the BSD library doesn't become GPL, even though its code comes into contact with GPL code. Redistribution of code that *contains* GPL code must be done under the GPLed license, but that goes beyond just "coming in contact" with it.
The GPL isn't altruistic, it's reciprocal
It's both, actually. It has altruistic goals, and a clause to propagate the altruism.
One definately is freer than the other, the BSD has less restrictions, the fewer restrictions something has, the more liberal it is.
But one can be incorporated into code that is then made un-free, therefore allowing the decrease of the freedom of users, while increasing the freedom of developers. That's what I mean when I say that one isn't freer than the other, because it depend whose freedom you're talking about. They are both free, in different way. Trying to quantify that amount of freedom is a fruitless exercise.
Axe to grind? What ax? I am responding to a troll's comment on how because Theo de Raadt doesn't lick Richard Stallman's testicles, he doesn't actually support free software.
The poster was not a troll, he was stating his opinion, and nowhere did he mention RMS, nor any part of his anatomy. Use of needless vulgarity and off-topic mention of RMS are clear signals that you have an axe to grind.
Edited 2007-02-17 05:48