I'm sorry that Nick feels misunderstood. The point I was trying to make was that the proposition as written was far too broad and agreeing with it probably means agreeing with popular bogeymen like the "pet a cat" licence.
Nick wrote: > So the question I was trying to ask was "do we believe that there are > *any* restrictions which would be acceptable?" -- with the intention that > if/when the answer turned out to be "yes", then we could discuss precisely > which restrictions they would be. Yes, there are at least some restrictions which are acceptable. Those are ones which do not contradict the DFSG. I think a key concept is that patents and copyright are orthogonal and should not be mixed together. It's fine for the copyright permission to require fulfilling some restrictions that fit the DFSG. It's also fine for the patent licence to do that. I think it's bad for the copyright permission to add conditions to the patent permissions, and it runs a big risk of making software patents affect swpat-free places but I'm not 100% clear how to relate that to freedom directly and in general. Even so, I suggest that general anti-patent patent licences do not follow the DFSG. Compare it with a copyright-based situation where I give you many pieces of software under DFSG-compatible copyright licences; then we get in some litigation over a particular piece of licensed software with claims going both ways. Can the other licences be free *and* terminate when you claim against me? (I think it's clear that the disputed licence can terminate if you breach it (like the GNU GPL), but I don't think even that can for just a counter-claim. Less sure, though.) -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]