Re: Endorsing version 1.0 of the GNU Social Contract

[Kaz Kylheku (gnu-misc-discuss)]

On 2020-02-14 02:04, John Darrington wrote:
> On Thu, Feb 13, 2020 at 09:26:03PM +0000, Daniel Pocock wrote:
> > Could it be better to work from the ground up, to document the points
> > which almost everybody agrees on before talking about the points that
> > are controversial?
>
> We have already done that.
>
> It was discussed at length between all interested maintainers, and the 
> result
> has been formally codified here:
>
>  https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/kind-communication.html

Okay, so:

1. The first clause of the proposed "contract", dealing with freedoms,
   is entirely redundant in the face of the bulk of the software
   using some version of the GNU Public License.

2. The remaining technically oriented clauses are flawed.
   - not every GNU project needs to collaborate with non-GNU projects
   - consistency is a nice requirement but can actually conflict with
     conformance to external standards and such.
   Also, this area is basically already covered in a long and detailed
   GNU document:

   https://www.gnu.org/prep/standards/

   (Hey, it even has something for me: I just noticed the words about
   the GNU projects not having to following external standards if they
   are bad.)

3. The last clause can be effectively replaced by a link to
   the above kind communication guidelines, which are better developed
   and make more specific recommendation about behaviors without
   promoting the unconditional inclusion of people based on their
   tribalistic traits regardless of how those people actually behave.

Thus, the entire document is redundant and pointless.

I'm leaning toward agreeing with Mr. Safir: this site and the document
are a sham set up as a pretext for some sort of bizarre takeover attempt
which will not work.