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Re: [ox-en] non-commercial software lic





yes they are.  I guess that depends in how "free" you want to be in
interpreting freeness.

Repeating the term in different contexts will make it meaningless. Of
course, this may be exactly the point you are trying to prove because
you think it already is a meaningless term. Others have made that
argument.

yes, they have and with a good reason.  The biggest tragedy of Free
Software is the title itself.  It has lead to so many misnomers by both
those who beleive in its agenda and those who do not. 

I'm using the term "Free Software," (capitalized), to refer to
something that has a very clear and fixed definition.

I'm not trying to redefine the word "free" or "freedom" here in any
expansive or meaningful way. I'm trying to refer to a social movement
called "Free Software" set of creating software that provide a certain
clearly defined set of "freedoms."

right, but it provides those "freedoms" by restricting other "freedoms",
and by possibly leaving the producers of the software open to
exploitation. The term Free Software was chosen by Pope Stallman I for a
reason.  The philosophical ambiguity of the notion of freedom can been
used mostly (but, maybe not always) as a call to arms.  This is not to say
that I prefer Open Source Software and it's call to capitalism.  The term
"Free"  in Free Software CAN be mixed too easily with the way "Free" is
used in Free Trade or the way freedom is used to "free" the people of
Iraq. 

I understand what you mean though.  You are talking about a particular
kind of software under a particular license.  fine.  let's both be more
careful in the use of that word.


what do you mean by a slippery sqlope?

The slippery slope is that once you start discriminating against
fields of endeavor or groups of users, you open up the possibility of
discrimination by other groups against groups you'd rather not keep on
the outside through (mis)use of your own legal tools and those of others.

this wouldn't have to be the case.  the GPL by default allows use and
distribution to all, and then begins to place restrictions on it.  For
now, lets call my hypothetical lic the Conditional Public License (CPL).
the CPL _could_ deny all use and distribution by default.  the source is a
read-only, learn-from-only entity unless given permission to use, modify,
and re-distribute.  so, to start peeling away your own control, you allow
these permissions to appropriate use and distribution. 
possible situations:  for educational purposes, for modification and
re-distribution under approved licenses provided that permission is
granted.

so, all rights are reserved, unless approval is granted.  approval is
then granted in default situations that you deem relevant.

again, just thinking out loud.  


It means that the work to keep people from doing these things has no
place in the text of a Free Software license. As I've said before on
this list, I don't think this means that all of these things are now
OK or that software developers should not attempt to write these types
of use out of their software. It just means that for a number of
reasons -- some pragmatic, some philosophical and some both -- I don't
believe that the text of the license is the place to do this.

maybe not.  but, it wouldn't have to be in the text, per se.  in fact, NOT
being in the text of the license would probably be better.  the lic could,
for example, exclude all uses unless permission was otherwise granted.
this may not fit under you definition of Free Software, but maybe it fits
under the term FLOSS, where a good effort is being made to make the source
available and negotiable.



the main points for me are:

1. Whether one should/could introduce ethical bindings into free
software, and how?

I think this is an interesting question and it's one I've done a lot
of thinking about. I think the answer lies in the nature of the
programs and projects people work on and the social cultivation of
ethics within Free Software communities.

this is a tough one, I am noticing.  I find that most programmers see
software as a tool, but fail to recognize the fact that knowledge and more
often than not, power, are embedded directly in those tools. 


3. how to get production to be funded?  if a commercial venture uses
or distributes a free software, I think it could be an interesting
step to have them legally bound to contribute to that production.

What you are talking about here is another, parallel software
development movement, not Free Software. That's not necessarily a bad
thing, although I think I will argue that it would be eventually.

maybe you can humor me for now.  it might not be GPL compatible, but it
might have it's uses.  I don't think you are arguing that the GPL is the
ONLY license of choice.

btw., do you think the LGPL is a Free Software lic?


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