🚀 go-pugleaf

[This is a follow-on to a discussion of Richard Stallman's commentary
 on the LGPL.]

Raul <rockwell@socrates.umd.edu> writes:
>Variety is fun.

More importantly, this variety in viewpoint is necessary. Think of it
as a political spectrum: public domain on one side, proprietary software on
the other, and the copyleft attempting to meld the best aspects of the two.

I prefer the meld! 

1. It protects my rights as a software consumer, since when I buy 
   copylefted software, I always really get it---source code and all to
   do with as I wish. 
   
   There are no restrictions on my use of the code I buy,
   except those necessary to keep it free from restrictions.

2. It protects my rights as a software producer, since when I produce
   copylefted software, no one can expropriate it for their own personal
   gain---no one can incorporate it into a proprietary product and make
   money off it. 
   
   Someone could incorporate it into a copylefted product and try to make 
   money, but then I could just buy that product and sell it myself if
   I so desired.

Other folks may prefer some other place in the intellectual-property
spectrum. That's their right and duty, in my mind, to take such a stand.

If you are strictly a consumer, you will prefer the public domain.
If you are strictly a producer, you will prefer proprietary software.

However, no one is really just a consumer or just a producer, except
for home-hackers, who produce nothing, and NIH people, who consume 
nothing. So, almost everyone is, or should be, interested in exploring the
middle ground in software licensing.

But just like politics, I'm not going to lambast and belittle others
who happen to think that my country, of software licensing policies,
should be farther to the political right or left. 
What I am going to do is try to convince them, through
cogent argument, that the middle road is best, since it provides well for
both producers (capitalistic?) and consumers (socialistic?), whether the
goods are material (like toasters), governmental (like social programs),
or intellectual (like software).

Let's keep these discussions in perspective by looking at the big picture, 
which is to provide a good world for all of us to live in! Use constructive
dialog (honey), rather than flames (vinegar), to catch and hold those minds
(flies)!

-- 
Kurt Baudendistel --- GRA
Georgia Tech, School of Electrical Engineering, Atlanta, GA  30332
internet: baud@eedsp.gatech.edu         uucp: gatech!gt-eedsp!baud