Rjack wrote:
Why not stop the rhetorical bullshit about "freedom" and admit the FSF wants to control how society treats the concept of intellectual property?
Because the FSF believes that users should have the freedom to run, read, modify, and share software. Copyright law grants the right to control copying and distribution of software to its copyright holders. The GPL is an instrument of copyright law, and it maintains the author's right of control, granting others permission for copying and distribution under limited conditions. Those conditions are meant to insure that any user who obtains software under the GPL has the ability to run, read, modify, and share the software. While the FSF may have opinions about how an ideal society would deal with trademarks, copyrights, and patents, their actions through the GPL are meant to insure only the freedom of users who obtain GPLed software.
The GPL is not about freedom -- it's all about control.
Control is granted by copyright law to rights holders. The GPL maintains that control, for the benefit of users, not for the benefit of software developers, and especially not for software developers who seek to deny users the four freedoms. It is time for you to admit that you resent the tantalizing aspect of free software - that it is tempting but out of reach to developers who do not want to offer their own software on the same terms that they receive the software they want to use. _______________________________________________ gnu-misc-discuss mailing list [email protected] http://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/gnu-misc-discuss
