Linus's insistence that if it is not specified, then the default is GPL 2 only, is part of the reason why we are doing this. One of the advantages of GPL 3 is that it solves compatibility problems with various licenses, many of which are widely used for java related code, for example ASL2 (we would like to use some ASL2 code in Freenet, the Apache Commons Compress library).
We may want to upgrade to GPL3 only in future, for compatibility reasons, but for the time being the proposal is that we make it explicitly "GPL 2 or later". We should have this discussion on the mailing list, so I have CC'ed it; where did you get the below PDF from? Nobody has responded to my original mailing list post. In terms of specifics... The FSF has always been political. It has sharply defined political goals. "DRM abuse", as they call it, is a direct threat to the FSF's political goals as expressed in the GPL2, and so they have reacted to it. Software patents likewise: IBM is trying to have its cake and eat it too: Funding linux on the one hand, and campaigning for ever stronger and wider software patents on the other hand in order to suborn Linux and make it *impossible* to develop it without corporate patronage; this could reasonably be termed (legal) theft. Freenet is also political... On Sat, Sep 23, 2006 at 09:58:11AM -0400, Ed Tomlinson wrote: > Hi > > Have you seen this? > > Ed > > On Friday 22 September 2006 14:57, you wrote: > > Hi, I am trying to clarify a minor licensing issue with Freenet 0.7. > > Since you contributed to it, I must ask: At the time of your commits, it > > was not clear whether Freenet was GPL 2 or later, or just GPL 2. We > > would like it to be GPL 2 or later, so we can transparently upgrade to > > GPL 3 if necessary (it has various advantages, the most practical of > > which being that it is compatible with various other free licenses such > > as the Apache Software License). The code will remain GPL 2 for the time > > being (GPL 3 isn't even out yet), but we want it to be forward > > compatible if possible. Could you please either: > > a) Tell me that you support the code being "GPL 2 or later" > > b) Tell me that you don't (Ideally with reasons!) > > > > Thanks. -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 189 bytes Desc: Digital signature URL: <https://emu.freenetproject.org/pipermail/devl/attachments/20060923/e82394ff/attachment.pgp>
