Re: [GNU-linux-libre] choosealicense.com fork with better wording, perhaps ?

[Riley Baird]

On 25/09/14 03:01, hellekin wrote:
> On 09/22/2014 08:53 PM, Riley Baird wrote:
>>> Murder is not a freedom, it's a crime.  Freedom amplifies
>>> possibilities, and does not restrict them.
>
>> If freedom is that which amplifies possibilities, but does not
>> restrict them, then why doesn't murder fit this description?
>
>> If I am able to murder someone to use their flesh in cooking
>
> *** then *they* cannot exercise their freedom, can they?  Are you
> trolling, or trying to be a psychopath?  If "your" freedom is
> entirely objective, then sure, you can think stuff like "I am free
> to raze the mountain, frack the land, cut the rainforest, nuke your
> city, and genocide the Yasuni to prospect oil".  Well no, it's not
> objective, we share a planet.  Theory tends to reach hard limits
> when put in practice. Psychopathy is a way to keep the world
> theoretical.

Remember, I was not saying that this freedom is a good thing, merely
that it can exist if we don't stop it. Some people *are* free to raze
the mountain, frack the land, cut the rainforest, nuke your city, and
genocide the Yasuni to prospect oil at the moment. A person should
have the greatest level of freedom possible that prevents them from
taking away others' freedom.

>> Yes, but you haven't established why helping the authors make
>> money in an artificial marketplace is more important than
>> protecting my free speech.
>
> *** If you consider parroting an exercise of free speech, you
> probably don't need free speech in the first place.

*Everyone* needs free speech, otherwise it is constantly under threat.

> On the other hand, authors today can make a living by giving away
> their work, for the reasons I mentioned earlier.  I repeat, that's
> not for everybody, but indeed, it's more akin to symbiosis than to
> parasitism: if you like a creation, you're more likely to provide
> for the creator, than if you don't.  In a society where people live
> together, and not only juxtaposed to each other in their
> psychopathic world, it actually happens like this.  Only by ways of
> propaganda are we led to believe, by people who stole from creators
> in the first place, that things work otherwise, and that only
> protected works in a competitive environment prevail.

Agreed. I'll also point out that you can make money from libre music
by doing things like live concerts too.

> If you look closely at the music industry, to take an easy target,
> the drawers of big companies are full of artists waiting to be
> discovered who, if they were to "freely express themselves" without
> their contracted label, who cast the shadow of their talent over
> stars that the companies spent millions to market.  This is also
> true of multinational corporations, that buy competitors to
> "disappear" their products.  In the land of free speech, the freer
> one has the biggest megaphone.

But, with effort, it is possible to get your own big microphone. Crowd
funding is an example of how that happens.

>> Opera does not allow distribution of the browser without
>> restriction.
>
> *** So, you agree with me.

You said "there are industries formed around distributing
"sourceless" software without restriction.  It's called freeware, and
the Opera browser is a good example of that."

>> So, it seems that we have to choose between two freedoms: freedom
>> of speech, and practical ability to study how (all) software
>> works. I'd prefer the one that can be worked around legally.
>
> *** You're still trying to turn freedom into a commodity.  I don't
> see how these two aspects, expression and inquiry, are opposed
> anyway.

What do you mean when you say that I am trying to turn freedom into a
commodity.

Expression and enquiry are opposed within software because

>> Hopefully we'll take less than 20000 years. :) Can you imagine a
>> universe with no conscious beings? If you believe in the Big
>> Bang Theory, then such a time must have existed.
>
> *** I don't think the Big Bang is anymore satisfying an explanation
> than the existence of god.  And yes, a universe without conscious
> beings is pretty much at our fingertips, given the stockpiles of
> nukes, anti-riot police, terrorism laws, and all-out war on
> sustainability that the "world leaders" are promoting and letting
> proliferate.

Okay, great, so we have a world without conscious beings. Would that
world cease to exist once the last conscious being was killed? If not,
then reality must be objective.

>> Belief in the Judeo-Christian God requires belief in an
>> approximately 6000 year old Earth, if we are to take the Bible
>> literally.
>
> *** Fortunately, only a lunatic fringe takes the Bible literally.
> That's where Intelligent Design meets American Atheists.  But I
> believe a majority of people who read it actually knows how to
> read, and can understand symbolism--or at least not take mere
> translations to the letter.  Beyond any authorship or actual
> contents, as the Italians say: traduttore, traditore (translator,
> traitor).

What does the 6000 year old Earth symbolise?

>> Maybe, if you put a FSF logo somewhere on the page, people would
>> see the origin of the document, realise the bias of the guide,
>> and read with this in mind. (This would be a good idea for the
>> github-based one too, although github seems apolitical to most
>> people.)
>
> *** As apolitical as BP, Monsanto, Syngenta, Halliburton, or Coca
> Cola, etc.  Heh.  Such as guide would probably be free itself, so
> if the original contains the FSF logo, any further copy could
> likely contain another, or none--that's to illustrate that your
> freedom of expression (shipping it with a logo) does not impede my
> freedom of expression (shipping it without one), and we can still
> both study the original work and debate about the virtues of that
> modification--I mean, if we didn't have anything more productive to
> do.

I respect your freedom of expression, that is why I did not try to
force you to put a FSF logo on it. (Also, Github should not be placed
in the same category as the above corporations that you mentioned.
Despite their usage of non-free software, they have made it so much
easier for free software to be made, gratis. Gitorious is better,
though, due to releasing the server software under the AGPL.)

>>> BTW, I don't think "man *did* come from a monkey" nor that
>>> evolution is gradual.  I think that human is the most complex
>>> animal humans know, that it came about by a wide range of
>>> gradual and sudden mutations, and is mostly an aggregate of
>>> bacteria and unicellular organisms that entered a fruitful
>>> symbiosis, leading to more complex symbiosis, mutations, and
>>> integration of the "human" organism.
>
>> Do you have any evidence to back this up?
>
> *** Look up "Acquiring Genomes: A Theory of the Origins of Species"
> by Lynn Margulis, and especially the concept of symbiogenesis.

Okay, I will. It will take me a while to find, and to read, so I can't
continue this argument for now.

>> Gaza is such a horrible situation. I wish that Israel and
>> Palestine would just agree to make peace (although, to be fair,
>> they are trying).
>
> *** Who is trying?  But honestly, I don't want to get into this,
> not on this list at least.

Okay, let's not get into it.