Since my name has been invoked.... :-)
*********** REPLY SEPARATOR ***********
On 20/09/2001 at 13:11 Gervase Markham wrote:
>>> Note that there are at least two folks--Simon Lucy and myself--who
>>> object to specifics in the current proposal for dual licensing (though
>>> not the concept itself) on the same grounds that GPL zealots dislike
>>> non-GPL licenses. It would allow people to turn the code GPL-only and
>>> keep their improvements to Mozilla files unusable by mozilla.org
>>
>> I think my views fall inline w/ those of Daniel and Simon.
>
>In this case you have to balance two sides, both of which have an
>element of uncertainty:
>
>1) The possible gains from having a greater number of potential users of
>mozilla.org code. These could be realised through bugfixes, more QA, and
>other sorts of contribution, as well as further spreading of the User
>Agent on the web.
Actually I think this is entirely spurious. Mozilla runs on Linux, no user that uses
Linux is really going to care about the source licencing. Developers that wish to
combine code from GPL may be affected but I've never quite seen the problem like that.
Its highly unlikely (except in insane cases such as readline and a very few library
exceptions) that existing GPL code could fit with Mozilla at all. It is more than
likely that new code would be written. Not contributing code simply because the
licence is _not_ GPL is a bad reason for not contributing and should be discouraged as
a matter of policy. Since such contributors are unlikely to contribute new code under
the MPL (otherwise why would they not anyhow), the contribution is only available to
GPL contributors.
>
>2) The possible losses from a fork.
There is a third which is a reduction of commercial development and contributing back
to mozilla.org.
We already have forks, and they are already GPL ones. Has anything been contributed
back from existing GPL implementations (which stress if not break the current
licencing anyway)?
My objections have mostly revolved around the avoidance of doubt. If the licence
language allows someone to effectively treat a source as GPL licenced code then,
because of the nature of that licence, it affects all uses (anything else is a fork).
Not being able to specifically identify a particular usage of licence has been the
crux of my dislike of any attempt to relicence existing source.
If the licence language enables someone to categorically for all time identify the
licence they used then I will be slightly mollified, however, since this is a complex
and difficult task to achieve I currently doubt it. NPL/MPL is a file based licence,
that's its strength, allowing GPL generally breaks that.
Originally, and some might remember this differently, the NPL licence was meant to be
a limited to I think three years. If clauses within the NPL are being used to
relicence by the back door and if new files are being licenced as NPL rather than MPL
then I think this is a breach of faith with mozilla.org.
Regardless of the licencing now or in the future I've separately come to the
conclusion that Mozilla is a dead open source project, some products may be produced
but I cannot see the quality improving in the current climate.
Simon
