Re: [GNU-linux-libre] Adding some scummvm game(s) to the "List of software that does not respect the Free System Distribution Guidelines"

[Ricardo Wurmus]

John Sullivan <john@wjsullivan.net> writes:

> On Fri, Jun 16, 2023 at 10:20:28PM -0400, Richard Stallman wrote:
>> [[[ To any NSA and FBI agents reading my email: please consider    ]]]
>> [[[ whether defending the US Constitution against all enemies,     ]]]
>> [[[ foreign or domestic, requires you to follow Snowden's example. ]]]
>> 
>>   > ... it is because to me, _no_ games are important enough to deserve such
>>   > fuss - they are purely for entertainment; so they are inherently low 
>> priority
>>   > - from that perspective, we may as well be discussing how many "lady 
>> gaga"
>>   > videos we can distribute - answer: "i dont care - we have bigger fish to 
>> fry
>>   > today" - "zero" is as good as any other amount - lets just decide, then 
>> move on
>>   > with due haste
>> 
>> That is roughly what I think, too, but not quite exactly.
>> I think it is of some importance to have free games and to distribute them.
>> No users _need_ games, but many users _like_ games.
>> Offering them free games can (1) help them enjoy using free systems
>> and (2) illustrate that they can develop more free games.
>> 
>> However, that is not pertinent to ScummVM.  Distributing ScummVM
>> has at best a minimal relationship to making free games more available.
>> 
>> Basically, John's argument makes a mountain out of a molehill, takes a
>> gram of that mountain, and makes inflates that to a mountain again.
>> 
>
> Unsubscribing based on this. The above is not an argument at all, and in
> no way helped advance the conversation toward a logical, evidence-based
> conclusion. I really don't care that much about ScummVM -- I care about
> a sound process for making decisions about the application of the FSF's
> guidelines, which this is not.

I second John’s conclusion.  This is no way to conduct a productive
conversation.

I find it worrying that an attempt is made to make a wide-ranging
decision to ban useful free software from being distributed in FSDG
distros while ridiculing arguments against that decision.  For me the
conclusion is obvious: I’ll just ignore whatever actions this group
declares as decided when *this* is exemplary of the decision making
process.

The tendency to ban, break, or mutilate free software applications to
make them conform to arbitrary rules and personal interpretations of
these rules (see the discussion about package managers for more
examples) alienates me enough from this group to not bother interacting
with it more.

-- 
Ricardo