Slashdot Mirror
PETA Creates New Animal-Friendly Software License
Anders writes "People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, the largest animal rights organization in the world, endorse a new FLOSS license. From the article: 'The Harm-Less Permissive License (HPL) is a permissive, non copyleft, software license. It is based on the FreeBSD license but with one additional restriction; the "harm-less" clause. It prevents software, licensed under the HPL, to be used for harming humans or animals.'" I guess this leaves the bunny-fueled power plant in Stockholm out in the cold.
It is not free software. If you want to promote free software, you also have to make it available to parties or uses you might disagree with. Otherwise it is not free.
But in order for it to matter, someone has to USE it.
I don't think PETA should be wading into the waters of making a new license - the mess they make in doing so is not worth the negligible benefit for the cause of animal welfare they're trying to serve.
If we had a time machine and could hop back in time to make initial versions of the GPL involve a broader cultural conscience, *maybe* this kind of thing would be appropriate, but it's too late now and adding another license that's likely to be incompatible with the GPL means that this is the license equivalent of "straight to videocasette".
For every problem, there is at least one solution that is simple, neat, and wrong.
I'll be sure to "FLOSS" after eating my delicious manly steak tyvm.
We should start a new Slashdot and return control to the geeks. It actually wouldn't be that hard to get some users to
You can no longer pen them in cages to achieve the desired marbling. This confines this license to small projects.
Whether or not it's in the license, if PETA finds out that you're harming animals with ANYTHING they're gonna get all up on, and sue you anyway. So what difference does it really make if it's in a license or not?
I refuse to use software that's been tested on animals.
I've seen video from hidden cameras of researchers stuffing javascript into bunnies eyes and ears. It's horrific.
This space available.
I misread that as hamless and thought it was a Moslem/Jewish licence!
Great minds think alike; fools seldom differ.
endorse a new FLOSS license. [...] It prevents software, licensed under the HPL, to be used for harming humans or animals.
Then it is not a FLOSS license. It restricts use ("freedom 0"), however noble the cause may be. (emphasis in "may"). It may not even be an EULA instead of a Licence.
I'm reminded of Asimov's 0th law of robotics, "A robot may not harm humanity or through inaction allow humanity to come to harm". Hunting deer, for instance, certainly harms the deer that are killed but in many areas the natural predators have been all but wiped out and not hunting would lead to massive overpopulation. Eventually causing much more harm to both the animals not being hunted and to the ecosystem in general.
So, what is 'harm'? Is a nuclear power plant harmful to humans or animals? Is a prison harmful to humans or helpful? How about a nuclear power plant? How about a video game that depicts the harming of humans or animals?
If I use this license, I am using a computer, which uses energy, which expends carbon dioxide from coal production, which harms the environment, which harms animals living in that environment. Am I legally unable to apply this license of my own volition?
If I use this license to create an alarm clock to wake people up, is that harm enough to them? Are they considered animals for the purpose of this license?
"No mules were flogged in the making of this software."
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
If you're going to use the rights granted under the license, you then must grant those same rights to others. Unfortunately, this license does not grant the right to be free from harm - so it doesn't make sense to address causing or not causing harm as a responsibility.
Still, it's a contract, and you can say pretty much whatever you want in a contract - the real goal would seem to be to make it expensive for people to disagree with PETA's stances (whatever they happen to be at the moment), which tends to be the real goal of most contracts.
Ryan Fenton
http://articles.sfgate.com/2005-06-23/opinion/17379611_1_peta-s-web-animal-cruelty-dead-animals
http://www.petakillsanimals.com/
http://www.newsweek.com/id/134549
and so on and so forth.
Fuck PETA. I feel my money and time would be better spent supporting the ASPCA. At least they don't make me want to cringe every time I hear or read about them.
I've pretty much reached the point where I equate PETA to Scientology. They're both a bunch of loonies with more money than sense.
"My God...it's full of trolls!"
A big problem with this kind of license is that it doesn't work well with other licenses, like the GPL, that don't allow people to add restrictions. If you wanted to combine HPL and GPL code in a program, you couldn't do it - making it GPL would violate the HPL; making it HPL or "GPL-plus-don't-hurt-animals" would violate the GPL.
... Fuck PETA. Fuck them right up their stupid terrorism-supporting asses. Until that vile cunt ringleader who is dependent on animal-derived insulin gives it up and just accepts the fact the she was born defective and the natural pecking order has singled her out for death, then they can all just eat me. If all animals are equal to us, then she can just suck it up and die.
I'm a fairly radical leftist and even I find PETA to be utterly ridiculous and ineffective. They harm their own cause with their hard line stance and near-terrorist (some would say, get rid of the 'near' part) actions. Sea Kittens? Really? And PETA have 'rescued' animals, only to let them die because they did not know how to care for them or did not have the resources. They are buffoons.
If you want to support a legitimate group with the same or very similar goals, support the SPCA I'm all about reducing suffering and cruelty, in animals and humans. But animals are delicious. An animal, raised right by humans for food, suffers FAR LESS than its wild counterpart. Being raised by a good rancher is a great bargain for a cow. A pleasant life with plentiful food and no predation, in exchange for a quick and painless death. If I were a cow, I'd take that over constant fear of predators and the threat of starvation.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
Use of any software consumes power and requires hardware. The creation of the power or the hardware for the creation of the power or the system hardware itself required the destruction of some component of the environment.
Also the consumption of power emits waste heat which contributes to global warming.
The plain simple fact is software in general is bad for animals.
http://www.petakillsanimals.com/petasdirtysecret.cfm Nuff said.
Of all the things I've lost; I miss my mind the most. - Mark Twain
This license is a permissive license, similar to the BSD license; however it requires at least one animal sacrifice when software is distributed. Note: 1 human sacrifice can be used to create a pool of 10 animal sacrifices. This reduces the amount of cleanup required.
and still can't stand PETA. "Buffoons" is the best way I've heard them described. Lavish expenses while they euthanize pets brought to them with the expectation of care. Financial support and a personnel revolving door with the ELF/ALF/HSUS crowd. Ridiculous campaigns that will only appeal to young children which seems appropriate to them since they often leaflet K-6 institutions and events with graphic material.
For every friend they make and funnel into a life of sad social marginality and constant maudlinity, they make a dozen enemies that after having contact with PETA will never, ever consider going vegetarian or vegan for any reason whatsoever.
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
I've been vegetarian nearly my entire life and vegan for several years, and I have to say that PETA annoys me to no end. One attention seeking stunt after another, and might I add, several that make animal-rights advocates look downright petty. This looks like yet another stunt by them, trying to stay relevant, and get as much exposure as possible. I often interact with people who assume I like what PETA does, but I should say here that I am far from alone, as an animal rights advocate, and as a vegan, when I express my dislike of their tactics. But beyond attention-whoring tactics, they are also intensely hypocritical (google for PETA stockholders Tyson foods). I hope they die soon.
Reply to That ||
more a kooky religion than anything else. In the mid 2000's I ended up being closely associated for career reasons with several people inside PETA, a couple of coordinators and some field workers, and had a chance to lunch with them a few times.
Their "ethical" position as we talked was that all pets must die and pet ownership ended, because it is inherently a form of suffering to lead the "unnatural" life of a pet. Furthermore, they carried this largely to humans; they made snide comments about people around us with children and often linked having children to the creation of suffering, since to live is to suffer (and therefore to create a human is to cause them suffering). They agreed that they could never take part in such an unethical thing.
Anytime you get into "all of humanity ought to die out because all humans do is suffer; oh, how glorious a world without humans and thus human suffering would finally be," you're deeply into cult territory, which matches up well with PETA's tendency to impose pressure on employees to end contact with intentionally non-vegan/non-vegetarian friends and family members.
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
Hey man, seriously... There is a place for every animal.
Right between the mashed potatoes and green beans!!
I don't like PETA and think folks who are convicted of eco-terror should be sent to Gitmo.
Who'd want to sleep with a vapid hippie chick anyway?
We are eternal, all this pain is an illusion.
Someone obviously did their homework here W.R.T. software licenses. My guess is that the name mentioned at the bottom of the license page (Anders '4ZM' Sundman) is someone who works with FLOSS licenses often, and (like many of us on /.) can easily rattle these concerns off pretty easily.
Still, I'm impressed that PETA would allow that kind of critical analysis on the license page. Usually advocacy groups concentrate on the advantages of their position, and avoid active pro/con debate, at least on official pages.
I'm also intrigued that PETA put up a 2nd license on the page -- the so-called wHPL license. The basic difference between the HPL and the wHPL is that the former is written to protect Humans + Animals, and the latter is just written to protect Humans. While PETA offering users a choice between the two is admirable, I am curious as to why they would author the 2nd license at all.
Don't get me wrong, protecting humans is a great and noble cause, but if PETA believes that the furry (and not-so-furry) critters deserve equal protection as humans, then why would they provide a license that allows users to protect humans while, at the same time, roasting up Bambi et al. for some shish-kabobs?
I see two possible motivations here
I may not agree with PETA on many things, but it's certainly nice to see such frank self-analysis accompanying a software license. Kudos to them.
coding is life
Heck, I can one-up whatever they're doing. At least 50% of my own software was written with a cat on my lap or a dog curled up under my desk. All of my software doesn't just avoid harming animals, it was created while actively bringing animals love, warmth, and satisfaction.
The Quirkz Handbook of Self-Improvement for People Who Are Already Pretty Okay
There's an app for that.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
What have People Eating Tasty Animals got to do with software anyway?
Why bother
Open Source licenses are not allowed to discriminate against fields of endeavor. When I was writing the Open Source Definition, there were Berkeley SPICE license that prohibited use by the Police of South Africa. Apartheid had ended, those Police were Black, and they were still prohibited.
I didn't want to see anti-abortion licenses and pro-choice licenses, etc. Just licenses for software that people could use without having to read the license or ask a lawyer.
Too bad that software patents broke the "not having to see a lawyer" thing for some companies in some places. But in general, if you just want to use software under a real Open Source license, go ahead.
Bruce Perens.