From: Michal Suchanek Date: 2006-04-06T06:54:54+09:00 Subject: Re: GPL v3 and Ruby License. On 4/5/06, Austin Ziegler wrote:> On 4/5/06, Gregory Brown wrote:> > On 4/5/06, Austin Ziegler wrote:> [...]> >>> I am mostly in favor of weak copyleft, in most pragmatic> >>> applications of licenses. Protect your source, ensure it will> >>> remain free software, ensure the license can't be buried under a> >>> proprietary license, etc. As far as linking and integrating with> >>> non-free software... i'd like to be an idealist and say it's evil...> >>> but of course, I wouldn't have a job if that were the case ;)> >> Something like the MPL. The problem is, with the way that the GPL is> >> written, the MPL is incompatible with it. This will not be changing> >> under GPLv3.> > I imagine I must be the FSF's "most loving critic". I do love these> > guys and their ideas, but I don't love the vagueness and rhetoric they> > are prone to:>> Yeah. That's Stallman through and through. I was one of the ~300 or so> folks heavily involved in the discussion list about the MPL back in the> day, and I got into some arguments with Eben Moglen about the whole> thing when the FSF was trying to get Netscape to *solely* use the GNU> GPL. (I consider the day that the Mozilla Foundation relicensed> everything as MPL and GNU GPL as a net loss for quality open source.)>> The problem is entirely in the GNU GPL's wording preventing further> restrictions on the code. Here's a gedankenexperiment:>> * Create a copyleft licence patterned after the GNU GPL (make it the> GNU GPL without the propaganda). Call it the ASCL (Austin's Strong> Copyleft Licence). Add one additional term that enforces your right> to be known as the author of a work (this is *not* the advertising> clause from the original BSD, mind you). The ASCL is incompatible> with the GNU GPL.>> The GNU GPL requires that your licence have a *subset* of restrictions> that the GNU GPL provides. It is not even clear if the GNU GPL would be> compatible the ASCL even if the additional term were removed. However,> even *one* additional restriction, no matter how reasonable, renders> your licence wholly incompatible with the GNU GPL.>> It's nonsense, and it could be fixed pretty easily.> heh, that is what they say they put in v3 :-) You see, if you allowed any additional restrictions, you could as welluse the BSD license.But they say they observed that some acceptable additionalrestrisctions tend to appear in other free licenses. And that they areincompatible because of that. So they will name the acceptableadditional restrictions for you. And you can add them or use codecovered by other licenses that include them in your gpl software :-) disclaimer: I did not read the license but this is discussed on thepage linked a few messages back just below the tivo issue Thanks Michal