Andrew Suffield <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > On Tue, Dec 09, 2003 at 11:10:05AM -0500, Anthony DeRobertis wrote: >> Now, there is a potential problem. Remember that scripting language >> mentioned before? If someone were to write a script that used both >> INVERT and STENOG, and then distribute that script, there might be a >> problem. But that's an issue for another thread. > > Actually, it's closer than you think. Any "product" [arbitrary > definition] that requires all three components is a derivative work of > all of them; that will almost certainly violate one or more of the > licenses. > > Hmm, that's actually interesting. We have an emergent licensing > constraint that is a property of none of the works involved, but only > appears when they are put together. I don't think we can even discuss > the DFSG-freeness of such a constraint in any meaningful way.
Since Debian distributes an Operating System (base, essential, etc) and a number of additional packages (optional, contrib, non-free) from which a user might wish to build an Operating System, I think it's quite reasonable to discuss the Freeness of such a constraint: it logically isn't Free by DFSG #1 to #9, but is (I think) under DFSG #10: the GPL and BSD licenses are explicitly Free.