Re: [Gnewsense-dev] 9wm - No FSF Free

[Ali Gunduz]

On Mon, Aug 31, 2009 at 3:22 AM, Alexandre Oliva<address@hidden> wrote:
> On Aug 28, 2009, "Paul O'Malley - gnu's not unix -" <address@hidden> wrote:
>
>> Rubén Rodríguez Pérez wrote:
>
>>> Its problem is the absence of *explicit* permission for
>>> modifications:
>
>>> Permission is granted to all sentient beings to use this software,
>>> to make copies of it, and to distribute those copies
>
>> The four freedoms don't look like they are being challenged, or am I wrong?
>
> Given that copyright prohibits modification, and the license doesn't
> grant permission for modifications, I think it's not enough for freedoms
> #1 and #3 to be respected :-(

AFAIK FSF doesn't see requirement of modifications to be only
distributed in form of patches as software freedom violation. Gnuplot
(which, despite its name, is not a GNU project) is under similar
distribution restrictions which you can find at
http://gnuplot.cvs.sourceforge.net/gnuplot/gnuplot/Copyright?view=markup.

I used to discuss the status of gnuplot over the FSF's irc channel.
(IIRC John Sullivan was part of the discussion at one point.) The
general view seems to be that since the ability to modify and
distribute the modification is not restricted, this kind of
restriction on the form of distribution doesn't violate users'
freedom.

Furthermore, gnuplot is listed under Free Software Directory, even
though its license is categoried under a one-of -a-kind class called
"SimplePermissiveWithRulesModifiedVersions".

I hope the similarity of these two licenses can clear the issue a little.

Ali Gündüz