You could compile your own version when something breaks, but otherwise use the vendor's. Sounds to me, though, that you're just a control freak, and not really into pragmatics.
It's like this: You're all free to eat at my farm.
As we are often reminded of in discussions about the RIAA, information isn't the same as physical property. You don't own the code unless you believe in copyright.
Copyright is an unnatural law designed to take away our freedoms, in the hope that society ultimately benefits from more works being created. If you want to argue what others are allowed to do with "your" code, then you do so not under the name of freedom, but restriction.
Well RedHat seem to be doing pretty well out of it!
That's because they ignore the GPL when it comes to letting others freely copy. They do release the source back, but you have to "clean" it before you can redistribute.
Is this money going to pay for wikileaks's legal bills, or for the site owners' new porshe? Think about it.
How would you, I, or anybody else know which? Donating money is a black hole. There are plenty of examples of people enriching themselves in the name of public service. Think about it.
The other possibility is that people must not be allowed to negotiate consideration or contracts.
I forgot to reply to this part. Contract law is between individual parties. Copyright law (which the GPL rests on) is a default limitation placed on everybody. So while I support contract law, it doesn't give you the same power over your work and others as copyright law. As an example, when somebody breaks a non-disclosure agreement they can be sued, but the damage is done. Everybody else is free to report the information.
Considering you're giving someone a choice of whether or not to do something and asking for a very small consideration on their part, I do not see how that diminishes their freedom.
We're talking about information. When I have freedom, I can do with information as I please. If I see you perform a clever trick, I can learn the trick and perform it myself, improve on it, and teach it to others. If you tell me a good story, I can tell the story to others, changing it as I see fit. Copyright law takes away natural freedoms -- the framers of the US Constitution knew this, and that's why they justified why they were creating copyright law and put limits on it:
"To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries"
In the long run, either one comes down to a loss of overall freedom, because nobody really is free if they cannot protect the fruits of their own labor.
This is the problem with Stallman's perversion of language. It has people making "Freedom is Slavery" claims -- people who would be derisive of these claims if made by a corporation, dictator, or religious nut. The vast majority of GPL advocates blame copyright law for the need for GPL, because it takes away freedom, yet here you are arguing for copyright. Freedom is Copyright.
There is a basis in freedom of me having control over my own work if I want it. Otherwise I'm not free to exercise that control.
You are confusing freedom with capability and power over others. You might as well say because you aren't an omnipotent god you don't have freedom. That argument doesn't take you very far.
I think you should carefully re-read my previous post and think critically about what I have said. Consider the concrete examples I have given. In particular, pay attention to the difference between freedom and empowerment/enabling.
I say this not to be a jerk, but because your reply seems more like a personal essay rather addressing my argument. At some point I can't just keep on repeating the same argument over and over if it is going to be ignored.
However, I will address a few points here that will hopefully clarify things. Even so, I again implore you to re-read my previous post with an open mind, and really think about what I have said. The definition of freedom is important, and we shouldn't give up our freedoms while being told it is in the name of freedom. If we do agree to give up freedom for other benefits, it must be done with our eyes wide open.
Are you saying that you don't agree with or like any copyright law
No, I have never said that. Only that we recognize when our freedoms are being taken away for other benefits, so that we may choose wisely.
or are you simply attacking Stallman?
I am attacking his perversion of the word freedom when stating that source must be given.
I am NOT arguing whether copyright laws are good or bad. I am NOT debating the merits of the GPL vs BSD. I am NOT attacking Stallman's ideology.
You could have a whole college course devoted to freedom. [...] Don't you first have to answer those questions, and define what freedom is, before you have the requirements to be able to argue about if a certain copyright law constitutes freedom?
In any debate, you can get so mired into philosophical questions that the practical usefulness of the debate is destroyed. I stick to fundamental principles and concrete examples. Yeah, you can stretch, squint, appeal to indirect-ad-infinitum consequences to make any point you want. Eventually you end up with "Freedom is Slavery".
You can argue that copyright law takes away freedom. [...] Pretty obvious.
Indeed, and "pretty obvious" wins over stretching, squinting, and indirect consequences.
You can't do anything you want, not if it treads on the freedoms of other life. This is the GPL.
This is a bad analogy. In one case you are violently ending somebody's life against their will -- you are taking away something they once had. In the other case a person voluntarily accepts a binary, and the GPL demands that additional material be given.
It uses the law to enforce the desire for developers to see their work, their life, not be "tread" on by others in ways they don't like
There's no basis in freedom that allows somebody to dictate what others do with their work. This is the obvious point that Stallman has managed to pervert because of his desire for everybody to have source code. If I buy a PS3 I can use it as a cheap computer, even if Sony sells them at a loss with the expectation that I will buy games for it. I can be a jerk and not let my little brother play with it. That's freedom. Sony may not like it. My little brother may not like it. But there it is.
Freedom means being able to do as you please -- within your own powers. It does not mean somebody else is compelled to help you do as you please. I have the freedom to read a book, but if I don't know how to read I can't. I cannot force somebody else to teach me how to read in the name of freedom.
The clause about giving source is about empowerment/enabling, not freedom.
The GPL is the closest to that he and his cohorts have found to allowing that under the current copyright laws, treaties, and conventions.
As I've already said, I don't have a problem with the GPL; it was a clever invention and works well for its intended purposes. My problem is the claim that requiring source code grants freedom, when in actuality the requirement takes freedom away.
If freedom is important and means anything, then the concept is important enough to protect from misappropriation. Imagine the world woke up tomorrow and said "You know what? This copyright business is more trouble than it's worth.", and copyright law was abolished. Yay! Now we have our natural freedoms to use, copy, and modify software as we wish.
Now where does the source requirement stand? There is no natural basis for it. You can't give away your software and demand others only redistribute it with source. That demand is the opposite of freedom.
Nobody said it was perfect, but can you can't exactly say you're not idealistic and he is when your ideal is that freedom means absolute freedom.
I'm not against being idealistic. Indeed, one of my ideals is not engaging in intellectually dishonest tactics like newspeak.
Wonderful. I love progress that involves government supporting a monopoly instead of non-proprietary, open standards. Oh, and they definitely need Digital Rights Management. I mean, it's really crucial that people don't freely copy these convention videos.
Nevermind the big, gaping analog hole. All they are doing is inconveniencing people and pandering to corporations.
If they had written the code they provided you from scratch, they could do whatever they want with the source and binary.
You can't place restrictions on information and call that freedom, for example by labeling some information GPL and exclaiming: "Share only under these conditions!". This applies even when you wrote the original source. When there is complete freedom, there is no ownership of information, unless you keep it to yourself.
Point of view does not matter in this case. When somebody is forced to give something to me, I have not gained freedom, I have gained government enforced regulation. This is in exactly the same ballpark as consumer protection laws. Ultimately, the law may be good or bad, but it is explicitly denying natural freedoms by forcing one party to act in favor of another.
You are correct, of course, that in the context of the FSF or GPL, "Free software" acquires a different meaning, but that's only within that context.
The ugly truth though is that it still falls under the umbrella of newspeak (which somebody else in the comments for this story called GNU-speak, which I find entirely appropriate):
newspeak: an official or semiofficial style of writing or saying one thing in the guise of its opposite, esp. in order to serve a political or ideological cause while pretending to be objective, as in referring to "increased taxation" as "revenue enhancement."
Requiring a person to give source is the very opposite of freedom. What Stallman is arguing for is a consumer protection obligation. Good or bad, it isn't freedom, and to label it as such is politics as usual.
I'm not a GPL hater, per se. What I do hate is the use of dishonest tactics. It's even worse when it's done by somebody as principled as Stallman, who if he saw these kinds of dirty tactics used by others would be the first to point them out. This is the guy who complains about Linux not being called GNU/Linux, and he completely perverts the definition of freedom to suit his ideology.
As for the rest of your post... of course you are not denying freedoms... you are just not supplying Free Software.
The whole point under debate is usage of the word "freedom". I and others know what Stallman means by Free (as in freedom) Software, we just don't agree with his GNU-speak usage of the word freedom.
If you write software... then YOU and you alone decide exactly how you want to distribute it. It is YOUR software, so you do with it what you will.
Obviously. That wasn't the point under consideration.
As for your thought "Any law created to enforce the GPL would only serve to deny freedom"... sorry, you are wrong again. The law that enforces the GPL already exists, and it is called "Copyright Law".
I guess you missed the first sentence of that paragraph: "Imagine a world without copyrights."
I feel like I'm arguing with another Anonymous Coward who jumped into the middle of the conversation without following along. In general I don't reply to Anonymous Cowards for exactly this kind of reason -- I don't like arguing with shadows, and most of their comments are so shallow or bad that they aren't worth replying to anyways. This will be my last reply.
The recipient has 1 and 3 (study and improve), even if they don't have the source. Sure, it's not as easy, but their freedom exists.
It's quite ridiculous to claim that someone's freedom is being denied by not giving them additional material. According to RMS's definition of freedom, I was under no obligation to give them the software in the first place, so by that logic not giving anything denies no freedom, but giving the software without the source denies freedom. Absurd.
Imagine I gave you a printed book for free, but not the source. Am I denying your freedoms?
Imagine a world without copyrights. Natural freedoms would exist -- use, copy, and modify all you want. The GPL clause of requiring source would have no legal basis. Any law created to enforce the GPL would only serve to deny freedom. This would be akin to consumer protection laws, some of which I approve of, some I don't, but don't call it freedom. That's just spin.
The first video starts with a picture of an old book from 1559 called "The Cosmographical Glasse". The title on the book cover is hyphenated to start with COS- instead of having COSMOGRAPHICAL all on one line. At first glance it looks like the abbreviation for Church of Scientology.
Posting a story on 9/11 to Slashdot and telling people not to talk about conspiracy theories is a joke. I noticed the Slashdot editor removed your Digg reference from the Firehose entry, but left the rest in. He should have just taken the whole sentence out.
Slashdot Mirror
The pleasure to format a Windows partition to put Linux
Now that's funny. You're paying Microsoft for the pleasure of erasing a product that you aren't going to use. Can I sell you some crap to erase too?
You could compile your own version when something breaks, but otherwise use the vendor's. Sounds to me, though, that you're just a control freak, and not really into pragmatics.
They do well out of the business model of 'buy it, or download it for free on our website!'
Can you find a "download for free" link for their "Enterprise" products?
It's like this: You're all free to eat at my farm.
As we are often reminded of in discussions about the RIAA, information isn't the same as physical property. You don't own the code unless you believe in copyright.
Copyright is an unnatural law designed to take away our freedoms, in the hope that society ultimately benefits from more works being created. If you want to argue what others are allowed to do with "your" code, then you do so not under the name of freedom, but restriction.
Well RedHat seem to be doing pretty well out of it!
That's because they ignore the GPL when it comes to letting others freely copy. They do release the source back, but you have to "clean" it before you can redistribute.
It puzzles me that some people still pick TortureForge
Using childish tactics like calling SourceForge "TortureForge" makes your argument look emotional and screechy.
IMO CSS has failed in so many regards I'm starting to wonder why tables were so bad at all.
The nice thing about CSS is that I can turn it off and text flows nicely. With tables I don't have that option.
Who are you kidding? You just fucked up somebody else's language. It's turtles all the way down.
Is this money going to pay for wikileaks's legal bills, or for the site owners' new porshe? Think about it.
How would you, I, or anybody else know which? Donating money is a black hole. There are plenty of examples of people enriching themselves in the name of public service. Think about it.
The other possibility is that people must not be allowed to negotiate consideration or contracts.
I forgot to reply to this part. Contract law is between individual parties. Copyright law (which the GPL rests on) is a default limitation placed on everybody. So while I support contract law, it doesn't give you the same power over your work and others as copyright law. As an example, when somebody breaks a non-disclosure agreement they can be sued, but the damage is done. Everybody else is free to report the information.
Considering you're giving someone a choice of whether or not to do something and asking for a very small consideration on their part, I do not see how that diminishes their freedom.
We're talking about information. When I have freedom, I can do with information as I please. If I see you perform a clever trick, I can learn the trick and perform it myself, improve on it, and teach it to others. If you tell me a good story, I can tell the story to others, changing it as I see fit. Copyright law takes away natural freedoms -- the framers of the US Constitution knew this, and that's why they justified why they were creating copyright law and put limits on it:
"To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries"
In the long run, either one comes down to a loss of overall freedom, because nobody really is free if they cannot protect the fruits of their own labor.
This is the problem with Stallman's perversion of language. It has people making "Freedom is Slavery" claims -- people who would be derisive of these claims if made by a corporation, dictator, or religious nut. The vast majority of GPL advocates blame copyright law for the need for GPL, because it takes away freedom, yet here you are arguing for copyright. Freedom is Copyright.
There is a basis in freedom of me having control over my own work if I want it. Otherwise I'm not free to exercise that control.
You are confusing freedom with capability and power over others. You might as well say because you aren't an omnipotent god you don't have freedom. That argument doesn't take you very far.
The FISA vote was just to keep the Republicans from claiming he supports terrorists.
So when it comes time to make a stand and explain his position, he chooses the path of political expediency. Compromise we can believe in.
I wonder what sort of feasible measures would help restore trust in the politicians?
Restore? You mean there was a time when people trusted politicians? When was it?
I think you should carefully re-read my previous post and think critically about what I have said. Consider the concrete examples I have given. In particular, pay attention to the difference between freedom and empowerment/enabling.
I say this not to be a jerk, but because your reply seems more like a personal essay rather addressing my argument. At some point I can't just keep on repeating the same argument over and over if it is going to be ignored.
However, I will address a few points here that will hopefully clarify things. Even so, I again implore you to re-read my previous post with an open mind, and really think about what I have said. The definition of freedom is important, and we shouldn't give up our freedoms while being told it is in the name of freedom. If we do agree to give up freedom for other benefits, it must be done with our eyes wide open.
Are you saying that you don't agree with or like any copyright law
No, I have never said that. Only that we recognize when our freedoms are being taken away for other benefits, so that we may choose wisely.
or are you simply attacking Stallman?
I am attacking his perversion of the word freedom when stating that source must be given.
I am NOT arguing whether copyright laws are good or bad. I am NOT debating the merits of the GPL vs BSD. I am NOT attacking Stallman's ideology.
You could have a whole college course devoted to freedom. [...] Don't you first have to answer those questions, and define what freedom is, before you have the requirements to be able to argue about if a certain copyright law constitutes freedom?
In any debate, you can get so mired into philosophical questions that the practical usefulness of the debate is destroyed. I stick to fundamental principles and concrete examples. Yeah, you can stretch, squint, appeal to indirect-ad-infinitum consequences to make any point you want. Eventually you end up with "Freedom is Slavery".
You can argue that copyright law takes away freedom. [...] Pretty obvious.
Indeed, and "pretty obvious" wins over stretching, squinting, and indirect consequences.
You can't do anything you want, not if it treads on the freedoms of other life. This is the GPL.
This is a bad analogy. In one case you are violently ending somebody's life against their will -- you are taking away something they once had. In the other case a person voluntarily accepts a binary, and the GPL demands that additional material be given.
It uses the law to enforce the desire for developers to see their work, their life, not be "tread" on by others in ways they don't like
There's no basis in freedom that allows somebody to dictate what others do with their work. This is the obvious point that Stallman has managed to pervert because of his desire for everybody to have source code. If I buy a PS3 I can use it as a cheap computer, even if Sony sells them at a loss with the expectation that I will buy games for it. I can be a jerk and not let my little brother play with it. That's freedom. Sony may not like it. My little brother may not like it. But there it is.
Freedom means being able to do as you please -- within your own powers. It does not mean somebody else is compelled to help you do as you please. I have the freedom to read a book, but if I don't know how to read I can't. I cannot force somebody else to teach me how to read in the name of freedom.
The clause about giving source is about empowerment/enabling, not freedom.
The GPL is the closest to that he and his cohorts have found to allowing that under the current copyright laws, treaties, and conventions.
As I've already said, I don't have a problem with the GPL; it was a clever invention and works well for its intended purposes. My problem is the claim that requiring source code grants freedom, when in actuality the requirement takes freedom away.
If freedom is important and means anything, then the concept is important enough to protect from misappropriation. Imagine the world woke up tomorrow and said "You know what? This copyright business is more trouble than it's worth.", and copyright law was abolished. Yay! Now we have our natural freedoms to use, copy, and modify software as we wish.
Now where does the source requirement stand? There is no natural basis for it. You can't give away your software and demand others only redistribute it with source. That demand is the opposite of freedom.
Nobody said it was perfect, but can you can't exactly say you're not idealistic and he is when your ideal is that freedom means absolute freedom.
I'm not against being idealistic. Indeed, one of my ideals is not engaging in intellectually dishonest tactics like newspeak.
Wonderful. I love progress that involves government supporting a monopoly instead of non-proprietary, open standards. Oh, and they definitely need Digital Rights Management. I mean, it's really crucial that people don't freely copy these convention videos.
Nevermind the big, gaping analog hole. All they are doing is inconveniencing people and pandering to corporations.
If they had written the code they provided you from scratch, they could do whatever they want with the source and binary.
You can't place restrictions on information and call that freedom, for example by labeling some information GPL and exclaiming: "Share only under these conditions!". This applies even when you wrote the original source. When there is complete freedom, there is no ownership of information, unless you keep it to yourself.
Point of view does not matter in this case. When somebody is forced to give something to me, I have not gained freedom, I have gained government enforced regulation. This is in exactly the same ballpark as consumer protection laws. Ultimately, the law may be good or bad, but it is explicitly denying natural freedoms by forcing one party to act in favor of another.
You are correct, of course, that in the context of the FSF or GPL, "Free software" acquires a different meaning, but that's only within that context.
The ugly truth though is that it still falls under the umbrella of newspeak (which somebody else in the comments for this story called GNU-speak, which I find entirely appropriate):
newspeak: an official or semiofficial style of writing or saying one thing in the guise of its opposite, esp. in order to serve a political or ideological cause while pretending to be objective, as in referring to "increased taxation" as "revenue enhancement."
Requiring a person to give source is the very opposite of freedom. What Stallman is arguing for is a consumer protection obligation. Good or bad, it isn't freedom, and to label it as such is politics as usual.
I'm not a GPL hater, per se. What I do hate is the use of dishonest tactics. It's even worse when it's done by somebody as principled as Stallman, who if he saw these kinds of dirty tactics used by others would be the first to point them out. This is the guy who complains about Linux not being called GNU/Linux, and he completely perverts the definition of freedom to suit his ideology.
As for the rest of your post ... of course you are not denying freedoms ... you are just not supplying Free Software.
The whole point under debate is usage of the word "freedom". I and others know what Stallman means by Free (as in freedom) Software, we just don't agree with his GNU-speak usage of the word freedom.
If you write software ... then YOU and you alone decide exactly how you want to distribute it. It is YOUR software, so you do with it what you will.
Obviously. That wasn't the point under consideration.
As for your thought "Any law created to enforce the GPL would only serve to deny freedom" ... sorry, you are wrong again. The law that enforces the GPL already exists, and it is called "Copyright Law".
I guess you missed the first sentence of that paragraph: "Imagine a world without copyrights."
I feel like I'm arguing with another Anonymous Coward who jumped into the middle of the conversation without following along. In general I don't reply to Anonymous Cowards for exactly this kind of reason -- I don't like arguing with shadows, and most of their comments are so shallow or bad that they aren't worth replying to anyways. This will be my last reply.
The recipient has 1 and 3 (study and improve), even if they don't have the source. Sure, it's not as easy, but their freedom exists.
It's quite ridiculous to claim that someone's freedom is being denied by not giving them additional material. According to RMS's definition of freedom, I was under no obligation to give them the software in the first place, so by that logic not giving anything denies no freedom, but giving the software without the source denies freedom. Absurd.
Imagine I gave you a printed book for free, but not the source. Am I denying your freedoms?
Imagine a world without copyrights. Natural freedoms would exist -- use, copy, and modify all you want. The GPL clause of requiring source would have no legal basis. Any law created to enforce the GPL would only serve to deny freedom. This would be akin to consumer protection laws, some of which I approve of, some I don't, but don't call it freedom. That's just spin.
Why is the story tagged scientology?
The first video starts with a picture of an old book from 1559 called "The Cosmographical Glasse". The title on the book cover is hyphenated to start with COS- instead of having COSMOGRAPHICAL all on one line. At first glance it looks like the abbreviation for Church of Scientology.
Posting a story on 9/11 to Slashdot and telling people not to talk about conspiracy theories is a joke. I noticed the Slashdot editor removed your Digg reference from the Firehose entry, but left the rest in. He should have just taken the whole sentence out.