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PHP Not Moving To The GPL
darthcamaro writes "In an article on InternetNews.com, PHP co-founder Andi Gutmans takes a small shot at RMS (and the FSF), labelling them as fanatics and as not being representative of PHP's user base. 'Most of PHP's user base are people that are using PHP to make a living and they wouldn't care less. "They are just happy that it's a PHP license and they can do whatever they want with it and can ship it with their commercial products," he said.' The comments were made in the context of the recent MySQL LGPL to GPL licesing problem which is what the article is really about. '"We definitely don't see eye to eye on the issue of licensing. He [Richard Stallman] doesn't like our licensing and we know that," Gutmans said. "We're aware of each other, but the PHP project has no intention of moving to some sort of GPL license."'"
Sheesh, that article is about MySQL's license which they had changed to not allow vendors to redistribute the server and the client.
php has it's license info here:
http://www.php.net/license/
anime+manga together at last.. in real time.
If you read the text of the php license it would appear to be almost on par with a bsd license. RMS prob is upset because it would appear the license does not require releasing source code if you realease modified binaries. It's all semantics of the word free. Free as in cannot be closed again or free as in you can do whatever you want with it. Nothing more than a bsd v gpl debate and neither camp with change the others mind anytime soon.
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Andi Gutmans is a co-founder of the Zend company, not PHP.
Rasmus Lerdorf is the founder of PHP.
Many projects require that you turn over the copyright to your code when you submit it. Those projects do not need to contact submitters in order to change the license.
The copyright to ReiserFS, for example, is completely owned by the ReiserFS dude. He can ship it under whatever license he likes. One of those licenses is the GPL. If you receive it under the GPL, then you have all the rights guaranteed to you via the GPL, so you can *only* distribute it under the GPL. Because you don't own the copyright.
Linux, on the other hand, does not require submitters to turn over their copyright on their code submissions. If Linus wanted to release Linux under the BSD license, he would need permission from every single person that has their copyrighted code in Linux. He did this intentionally, as a guarantee that it would never happen.
The FSF does require copyright on all it's code, which means that if someone sued the billy-blue jeepers out of the FSF, in theory they could acquire the assets of the FSF, and release closed-source versions of Emacs or something. The FSF, however, has a greater standing should they ever go to court to enforce the GPL for one of their projects.
Of course, the kids at the FSF are pretty sharp. They may have some method of ensuring that their code will never fall into SCO's hands or something. Dunno.
There are no trails. There are no trees out here.
The GPL is a license, and you can license your code under the GPL, BSD, and then some license you made up if you want to, and people can use it on all of them. It's your copyright, the GPL is just the license you choose, and the people who originated it do NOT gain control of your code.
And, you can use the FSF's work without their permission in accordance with the terms of the GPL. I don't understand that statement in the least. Are you saying that somehow the GPL was written in trickery and none of it is actually valid? That's really all I can derive from that, and I would certainly like you to back up that statement that the GPL is invalid.
Open Source goes beyond the GPL. Can you explain how open source is not a movement? You make this statement without any backing of logic, and SOMEHOW get modded up. Open source is a movement, the GPL is a license, the FSF is an organization that promotes free software and the GPL...
It would seem you do have something against the GPL, spreading all of these lies... I suggest you check out the GNU website to understand more thoroughly what you are talking about. I've read the licenses and the missions statements. I also have read the actions of the organizations outside of their press releases. I suggest you do the same.
That's scary.
Sigh...
From the BSD license:
Here are three ways in which I could misapropriate BSD code: Distribute source or binary without the notice and endorse my shit with BSD developer's name.Is that what you are asking for?
I call BS. There's nothing in the GPL that says you have to turn over your copyrights to the FSF. Some people do this, some don't. Works created and distributed under the GPL do not have to be turned over to the FSF. I sincerely hope you are just misinformed and not spreading Gatesian FUD.
(OT aside: "4 Interesting" is way overrated IMO)
Because they are saying very different things about software and, as a result, they reach different conclusions on some of the most interesting debates about software and how people should be treated.
Freedom of choice is deceptively attractive because people who focus on choice can easily be undermined. Consider web browsers, for instance: if we only had 3 browsers to choose from (say, Microsoft Internet Explorer, Opera, and Netscape) choice would be satisfied. We would not have software freedom, however, because none of those browsers are free software. They are all proprietary programs. Choice is not bad to have but it is not the heart of either the free software or open source philosophies and choice alone will not bring you the ability to share and modify software.
Nobody is challenging these powers (certainly not any free software or open source advocate). But there are significant differences between the two licenses you mention, so it is important to help people make informed decisions.
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