On Thu, 13.09.2007 at 23:09:51 -0400, Jason Dixon  wrote:

quoted text
> It boggles my mind that we can lie around complacently, arguing about

> installer menus and taking the bait from trolls, while our freedoms

> are quickly eroding away.  The rights and recognition of one of our

> own developers (reyk@) have been molested, and all we've done as a

> community is to participate in useless flames and blog postings.

> Theo has thrown himself, once again, against the spears of the Linux

> community and their legal vultures in order to protect our software

> freedoms.  How many of us can say we've done our part to defend truly

> Free Software?

>

> You don't have to be a lawyer or OpenBSD developer to make a

> difference.  Email the SFLC and FSF and remind them that Free

> Software consists of more than the almighty penguin.  OpenBSD is

> arguably the most Free and Open operating system available anywhere.

> The SFLC and FSF need to remember that they were created to protect

> victims, not thieves.

>

> Your donations are important for keeping the servers running, but

> your voice is necessary for keeping our freedom alive.

Just today, I was reading about a bug in OpenBSD's dhcpd. Nothing much

wrong with that, anyone can make a mistake. A short while later I came

across the message that some VMware thingy also had the same problem,

because they derived their dhcpd from OpenBSD's code base (or probably

just included it, I didn't check nor care).
I'd like to summarize:
 * OpenBSD publishes some pieces of software under the BSD license.
   case 1: Linux takes some of it and publishes it under the GPL:

           Big war ahead!
   case 2: Company XY takes some of it and publishes it under their own

           license (binary only etc.): Everyone's happy... no?
Maybe some of you can explain why attribution (the only thing the BSD

license really demands) is not enough in the first of these two cases,

or what the problem really is. It's imho a very easy question to tell

which one out of ("Company X", "GPL") protects my freedoms better...

And I also dimly remember that some popular Linux project clamoured for

the removal of (undocumented) binary-only stuff from their release even

earlier than OpenBSD 3.9 came out.
This kind of proceedings is generally wrong-headed and a bane for the

OpenBSD project in general. Unless you start going after all commercial

users of OpenBSD, like eg. VMware, you are simply destroying that

credibility and respect you have worked to earn over the years.
Best,

--Toni++