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On Thu, 2007-09-13 at 07:09 -0400, Nick Holland wrote:
These are definitely not the views of the GNU project. They *might* be
views of the self-styled "Linux nerds" that think they are "k00l" and
"eleet" because they read Slashdot, but to imply the GNU project
espouses these views is, quite frankly, slanderous.
> "Give back to the community!" (which really means, "I'm the community,
There may be some in the free software movement that think like this,
but this is far from a majority view.
> "Free as in Freedom!" (but "Free as in no monetary charge" beats
Again, Richard Stallman's famous speech makes it clear monetary charge
is not the reason for the free software movement.
> Free software: It's all about the price.
You know, it's fine if you hate the GPL. But I'll be damned if I just
sit here and let you spread outright Goddamned *lies* about the free
software movement and the people that represent it.
I'm not cheap. I'm not greedy. All I am after, is the freedom to use my
computer the way I want to without Microsoft, Apple, Google, AOL, Adobe,
Real, or other large companies being able to step in and say "no you
can't do that, it's not in our (financial) best interests to let you".
For me, it's always been about freedom. I would think for most of the
free software movement that truly knows what's going on, it *is* about
freedom.
While it may be seen as distateful to make modifications to BSD-licensed
code, and place those modifications under the GPL or a similar "share
alike" license, based upon what I understand of copyright law, it's
perfectly legal. Even though BSD-style licenses are compatible with the
GPL, there are perfectly acceptable social goals achieved only by
releasing under the GPL or a similar license.
--
Shawn K. Quinn
