Slashdot Mirror
Debian Can Now Amend Social Contract, DFSG
An anonymous reader writes "The Debian Project, creators of the Debian GNU/Linux distribution, has voted to allow amendments to their Social Contract and Free Software Guidelines, as long as the developers agree with a 3:1 majority. The full text of the various amendments can be found in the original call for votes. Debian developer and XFree86 packager Branden Robinson has already proposed an amendment to the Social Contract that removes the requirement to maintain an archive for non-free software or "contrib" software (free software that depends on non-free software to work). Debian could still maintain this archive, but would no longer be required to do so. The proposal also updates the Social Contract to clearly require all works in Debian to meet the Debian Free Software Guidelines, not just software, which had come up repeatedly in the discussions over the non-free "GNU Free Documentation Licence". Both of these updates have been under consideration for some time, but were waiting on the ratification of the amendment procedure. The Debian Project voted on this amendment using their modified Condorcet voting procedure, which allows voters to rank the choices in order of preference, eliminating the "lesser of two evils" effect common to simple majority voting."
When I created the original Debian Social Contract, non-free wouldn't have been self-supporting. But we've had this hypocracy about non-free since then. Non-free is not officially part of Debian, but is maintained as part of Debian, using all of the same facilities and within the same organization. Debian can now afford to be 100% Free Software and no exceptions, and can put non-free somewhere else with people who care about it. APT will handle this very easily, there's no overhead to the user except perhaps to change /etc/apt/sources.list once, which we can do for them with a script.
Bruce
Bruce Perens.
Bruce
Bruce Perens.
Way to go! These people have been the biggest group on the web for some time seriously debating the mechanics of how to vote. I know they've got the fundamentals right. Their choices and extentions have been well thought out too.
Now that we have a well-defined best known way to vote, perhaps we can get governments to adopt it for city, state, even national elections. I very much want the US to become more democratic.
Depending on what you're doing, check out the "testing" and "unstable" branches of Debian. They have much newer software packages, but are not in a stable release. Many regard these as more stable than, for instance, a Red Hat "stable" release.
"The price of freedom is eternal vigilance." - Thomas Jefferson
I'm tired of all this "we hate software if it's not free"
You have it backwards. It's not that anyone hates software, it's that there's so much free software there's no reason to use things with restrictions. Why waste your time fooling around with something that's got strings attached when there are 5 or 6 free packages that do exaclty the same thing? How exactly do you hate software anyway?
What I'm tired of is all they hype of commercial software. I hate hearing loud mouths promise me an email client will make me feel like superman. Someone trying to sell me shit that does not work well and that I don't need, that's something to hate.
Now, Mr. Fart, feel free to pay for the above mentioned sleaze bags all you want. Take it and your stale nonsense back to Mr. Gates where it comes from and belongs.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
If you want the US to be less plutocratic, I think you need some changes in the media. People vote according to what they are presented with in the news, and the news here is produced for ratings, rather than as a means of cultivating an educated voter. The Internet was supposed to fix that simply by providing more variety in news programming, but it has not, so far, done so.
My current idea would be to require of broadcasters, in exchange for their access to spectrum, that they have much higher standards regarding integrity of news programming, that they not apply ratings to news at all, that they present it when people would see it, and that they broadcast as much news as they do advertising in any 24-hour period. To say that the broadcasters would not like this is an understatement. But they are using a precious spectrum resource for which they presently pay nothing. This would address the "if it bleeds it leads" problem that keep so many of the U.S. people in a state of permanent terror, among other things. And as long as you don't regulate content, you don't get into first ammendment problems.
Bruce
Bruce Perens.
I have some simple rules for licensing that you can use if you don't want to get in too deep. First, make sure that the copyright holders (that's you and anyone else who contribute) own what they are contributing. They can't have cut and pasted from elsewhere, they have to have written the code.
Then, use the GPL for stuff you do on your free time, and use the BSD license for stuff that someone else pays you for if they don't like the GPL.
The GPL is sharing with rules, the BSD license is a gift with almost no requirements upon the folks who get the code. It makes sense that if you do the work on your own time, people who modify the work should give you the same rights on their changes that you gave them on the original code - and the GPL requires that. But if you get paid to do the code, BSD is fine - because it's not a gift as far as you are concerned.
Thanks
Bruce
Bruce Perens.
Have you ever actually met the man and heard him rant? Most of his printed work is far from rant material. It's factual, positive and forward looking. Generally they are more positive than telling people in a Debian thread that you personally won't use Debian anymore.
Why am I labelled a troll for speaking up?
I don't know why. I would have moderated your post as flame bait. Wading into someone else's conversation about a social contract to tell them they are a bunch of elitists for thinking of pine as different from mutt due to likensing issues, crapping on a well respected member of their community and all that is simply infamatory.
You don't need to back down about elitism, you need to save it for the proper place. You might think long and hard about it first though. Consider what those supposed elitists are advocating, software freedom. Is that something you want to thwart? Very few actual linux users actually act the way you presume they do. I get tired of Bible thumpers on Burbon Street, but I always smile for them and pay some respect. They are out there doing things and might do some good. What good does it do to call them names?
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.