[Discuss] OSS licenses (was Home NAS redux)

[Mark Woodward]

On 01/09/2013 07:13 AM, Edward Ned Harvey (blu) wrote:
>> From: discuss-bounces+blu=nedharvey.com at blu.org [mailto:discuss-
>> bounces+blu=nedharvey.com at blu.org] On Behalf Of John Abreau
>>
>> Under democracy, citizens are prohibited from seizing power by force and
>> imposing a military dictatorship on their fellow citizens. Under anarchy,
>> citizens are not so prohibited.
>>
>> The equivalent CDDL-type argument would be that anarchy is "more free"
>> because you're not prohibited from taking away everyone else's freedom.
>>
>> It strikes me as absurd to claim that a system that fails to protect
>> freedom is somehow "more free".
> I think you're hinting that CDDL fails to protect freedom.  Please elaborate, but begin by reading the CDDL.

The problem with the CDDL is that it allows you to combine CDDL licensed 
software with non-CDDL licensed software to create a "larger work" which 
is not CDDL where only the CDDL portions are protected. This will do 
nothing to prevent the MIT kerberos problem.

The freedom to deny freedom is NOT a freedom. By combining the FREE 
software with NON-FREE software you can create NON-FREE software. This 
does not protect FREE software.

It is your right to create non-free software. It is your time and effort 
i.e. "personal capital." No one who supports freedom would deny you 
that, and I myself make my living doing so.  However, taking someone 
else's "personal capital" which you acquired exercising your freedoms, 
modifying it it and then denying anyone the same freedoms for the whole 
is theft, legally in the case of GPL or morally in the case of MIT/BSD. 
It is personally repugnant to me to take what is not mine and deny the 
benefits of it to others. I consider that unethical.

The only inversion example in this is the GPL modifications to BSD/MIT 
code, and while unfortunate for the BSD/MIT folk, no actual freedom was 
lost because, as we all know: the freedom to deny freedom is not a freedom.





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