🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1992Jan10.023251.15217@alphalpha.com> nazgul@alphalpha.com (Kee Hinckley) writes:
>software.  In other words, most GNU software would have been released
>for general use had the GNU license not existed.  It wouldn't have
>been sold.

  The people writing copyleft'ed software don't have to make it
copyleft. Even if I write XYZApp and build and compile it with bison
and gcc, if I'm putting it in the public domain, I can simply
distribute source and say ``if you don't have gcc and bison, maybe you
can't compile it.'' 
  This round started because someone posted a note about their regexp
library. Well, to start, I think they were foolish to write yet another one.
Yes, there is one that comes under the copyleft. There are also
several other ones out there. 
  Secondly, why couldn't they use the copyleft'ed one? Because they
weren't going to distribute the end product in the public domain.
Seems to me that they *should* spend the time to write the whole
thing, or buy one from someone else if they intend to sell a product
rather than a service. 

  [a small aside: I can't see the US president making a trip to Japan
if GM, Ford and Chrysler sold automotive service rather than
automobiles. Cars are expensive to ship. The best servicepersons would
come to your site and fix the problem. Of course, cars aren't
software, and it is awfuly hard to ship Ford Taurus' via TCP/IP. I'm
Canadian not American btw.]

>currently in fact restricting availability.  It is doing so in effect

  Yes. We/they using the systems of software hoarding to make sure
that the software hoarders can't hoard our/their software. [I
obviously don't speak for the FSF or LPF, but I have copyleft'ed at
least one significant Amiga program]

>by boycotting commercial software companies.  They can't make use
>of the GNU software in their code.  In that sense GNU is slowing the
>rate of advancement.  Now if the boycott is sucessful, then the long

  ``rate of advancement'' --- now there is an interesting term. 
  Developers (of land, not software) would say that the environmental
movement is slowing the rate of advancement (and reducing the rate of
return). Environmentalists, see this ``rate of advancement'' as a loss
rather than a gain.  

  One can see that it doesn't matter much to IBM's workers whether or
not there are software patents. They simply cross-license everything
(probably with Apple and Mark Williams). The little guys simply cease
to exist. The big guys now have a virtual monopoly, which is *exactly*
the situation any money making entity likes. (Just ask Bell Canada who
argues with the CRTC [Canadian Radio and Televison Council] what they
think of Unitel [CN/CP] competition)

  Worse, people that wish to take public code and restrict it so
they can sell it (rather than their service), are saying that they
deserve a monopoly on selling this code. Fine, I'll willing to grant
them their right to do whatever they like with creative works. 
  But, by placing my code under the copyleft, I'm saying that I will
not allow a monopoly to be had on the code. Anyone can use it and
modify it, and give it to their friends. If they like, they can even
*compete* with me for service. 

>sending out pieces of my code to help people address X/Motif problems,
>and I've released several submodules as well).  I don't see that

  There is a neat one. I tried to play with Winterp the other day. I
don't have Motif. I'm a student. I'm in debt for my 3/60 as it is. I
considered buying Motif. I wanted to see Winterp first, so I brought
it to a friend's office and tried to build it on their SGI. That was
fun. Too bad I didn't have SGI socket library sources, I might have
figured out why the connection to the server was all messed up (SVR3.x)

>I thought was commercial quality (haven't seen too many of those)
>I would too.  I don't see how someone who writes a malloc package
  
  Dispite the huge amount of money that my university pays for Turbo
blah licenses, they weren't even able to hire someone for their
customer support that knew the technical support people could be
reached via email. If'd been gld I was having problems with, I could
have M-x C-f ~gnu/binutils/ld.c. If the university payed Cygnus for
support, I could probably have called them instead.

>but some people do - that's fine.  They can always put in a 
>restriction to keep out such commercial use, or better yet, as
>is often done, ask that anyone who considers including it 
>approach them first - possibly even pay them.  In fact I've found

  Guess what: nothing prevents you (to my knowledge) from making a
copyleft'ed release and also selling rights to software you have
created. The copyleft prevents people from using your code without
consulting you. 



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