Detlef Faber
> First:
>
> <sarcasm>
> We are all pretty capable of judging the end of a sentence by the usual
> orthographic. There is really no need to express a sentence end by an
> additional PERIOD.
> </sarcasm>
>
> Am Samstag, den 24.10.2009, 22:04 +0000 schrieb Martin Spott:
> > Erik Hofman wrote:
> >
> > > [...] If I were the guy or company we' re talking about I
> > > simply would fork the project from right before this change and then
> > > implement all changes to the code except this one.
> >
> > Well, Durk's 'patch' would have been an excellent probe to check if
> > they are really serious about affording money for development, willing
> > to maintain their own source and data trees or if the whole 'company'
> > is nothing but an affiliated marketing department which is quick at
> > building web sites and ripping off free software.
>
> > But now this 'test' has been pretty much invalidated after just a few
> > overly clever people couldn't resist initiating a storm in a teacup by
> > crying "GPL violation" ....
> >
> > What a wonderful world,
> >
> This is a serious issue and capable of causing severe damage to
> FlightGear. Especially those "protecting" the GPL, fail to adress the
> concerns of those contributors who are not comfortable with
> FlightProSims business model.
> I once was told to stop contributing to FG if I didn't like the license,
> and I really considered doing so. I know there are a some contributors
> thinking about leaving due to some jerk rebranding FG and selling it.
>
> While this seems be perfectly within the limits of the GPL, most (non
> lawyer) people feel that this is some kind of fraud.
>
> There are some commercial Applications using FlightGear and there is
> absolutely nothing wrong with it. Most of these Applications provide
> additional Benefits for their Customers like specialized Hardware or
> support FlightGear by contributing Code or Content. But with
> FlightProSim I get the impression that there is no addition to FG at
> all.
>
> I sympathise with Durks intentions, at least he is trying to adress the
> issues that gives a lot of FG devels a headache (including me).
>
> Rather than shouting down his well intended move I would expect some
> Suggestings how to deal with this appropriately.
>
> So don't come up with a "Stop contributing if you don't like it"
> solution. I'm sure there are alternatives.
>
I'm afraid that there are just 2 options -
"Stop contributing if you don't like it."
"Change the license going forward."
Note - you cannot withdraw your contributions to date from GPL. And since
FG/SG is largely complete and released under GPL, trying to put cats back
into bags is a pretty pointless exercise.
Whilst I absolutely agree that Durk was well intentioned, his action was to
amend the basis on which FG is distributed unilaterally, without the prior
agreement of ALL the contributors to FG/SG, and to attempt to do it
retrospectively. And whilst I have no big issue with WHAT has been done, I
dislike intensely HOW it was done.
If, and it's a big if, we wish collectively to change the license going
forward, then so be it. Meanwhile, Durk's well intentioned, but
inappropriate action, which makes us look stupid at best, and might be
considered to be against the spirit if not the letter of the GPL at worst,
should be withdrawn immediately while this issue is sorted.
Vivian
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