Linked by Thom Holwerda on Fri 31st Aug 2007 19:24 UTC, submitted by Anonymous
FreeBSD The latest issue of the FreeBSD newsletter contains a letter from the Vice President of the FreeBSD Foundation about the GPLv3. "On June 29th, the Free Software Foundation unveiled version 3 of the GNU General Public license. Even though the majority of software included in the FreeBSD distribution is not covered by any version of the GPL, our community cannot ignore this very popular license or its most recent incarnation. Through extremely successful evangelization, and the popularity of Linux, the misconception that OpenSource and the GPL are synonymous has become pervasive."
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RE: Comment by dylansmrjones
by Oliver on Fri 31st Aug 2007 22:14 UTC in reply to "Comment by dylansmrjones"
Oliver
Member since:
2006-07-15

There is no holy war. There is just one party who refers to a mockery of freedom and there is another party who refers to real freedom. Ask some prisoner about *real* freedom or some people in the VR of China about it.

>They are both wrong - it's that simple.

It's that simple? Yes indeed if you don't know anything about these terms.

Reply Parent Bookmark Score: 5

RE[2]: Comment by dylansmrjones
by taos on Fri 31st Aug 2007 23:30 in reply to "RE: Comment by dylansmrjones"
taos Member since:
2005-11-16

What does "VR" stand for?
I am curious because you seem to compare some of us to prisoners, in the context of freedom, the lack of.

Reply Parent Bookmark Score: 2

Jojotdfb Member since:
2005-07-08

>BSD is the freedom to enslave other people.

How so? How does BSD enslave anyone? If anything it gives me code to learn from and use in ,almost, every way I see fit. How does that equate slavery?

Reply Parent Bookmark Score: 3

StephenBeDoper Member since:
2005-07-06

BSD is the freedom to enslave other people. GPL is the freedom from slavery.


I really, truly wish there were a enforceable moratorium on the use of the word "Freedom" when discussing software licensing. If nothing else, it's a misuse of the word - the definition that's relevant is "power to determine action without restraint." In literal terms, that doesn't apply to any license I can think of - commercial, GPL, BSD, MIT, etc (with the exception of public domain, which isn't really a license per se). Really, what is a software license if not a list/set of restrictions on use & distribution? Once something is restricted in any way, then it is - by definition - not free.

Certainly the relative degree to which different licenses are restricted is a valid topic - and as with anyone else who finds the subject interesting, I find specific sets of restrictions (licenses) more palatable than others. But that doesn't mean that it's valid for me try to equate my preferred set of restrictions with "freedom" - and equate all other sets of restrictions with "enslavement."

Reply Parent Bookmark Score: 4

zsitvaij Member since:
2006-06-14

There is just one party who refers to a mockery of freedom and there is another party who refers to real freedom.


"Between the weak and the strong, it is freedom that oppresses and the law that liberates." J.J.R.

Edited 2007-09-01 09:07

Reply Parent Bookmark Score: 6