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by timschmidt 725 days ago
> If they had to use QNX or similar, they'd pay to do it. If they had to use GPL, they'd pay to close off their changes, which would be great for funding more free software.

Last I checked there were about a thousand open source OSes. Hundreds under BSD-like licenses. Here's a partial list: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_BSD_operating_systems

It sounds like you're advocating for wiping them all from history and outlawing everything but GPL licensed code, which just isn't possible, nor desirable. Sorry?
1 comments
lelanthran 725 days ago
> It sounds like you're advocating for wiping them all from history and outlawing everything but GPL licensed code, which just isn't possible, nor desirable.

That's a strawman: Nothing I said implied any sort of genocide.

I'm pointing out that the pro-user license has more benefits than the pro-corporate licenses.

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timschmidt 725 days ago
> That's a strawman

Is there another reading of "If they had to use" that I'm not aware of? Seems to imply force either through legal or practical means.

> the pro-user license has more benefits than the pro-corporate licenses

I'm a user and a developer and neither of those descriptions seem to apply to the licenses being discussed. I benefit from both, as do you, as does the whole world.

I bet proprietary software vendors get a real chuckle out of this sort of infighting.

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lelanthran 724 days ago
> Is there another reading of "If they had to use" that I'm not aware of?

Well, yes.

You started your argument with "If BSD wasn't available they'd be using QNX".

So I followed on from that with "If they had to use QNX... If they had to use GPL..."

I was just following the logical outcome of your "If BSD wasn't available" argument, not advocating that BSD must not be available.

> I'm a user and a developer and neither of those descriptions seem to apply to the licenses being discussed.

I don't know how you can think that "pro-user" doesn't apply to the GPL - it's the singular goal of the GPL to protect user freedoms. This has never been ambiguous.

GPL == freedom for the user. It's always been this way. This is nothing new. You cannot, with a straight face and at this point in the conversation, claim that you didn't know the goal of the GPL.

As far as the pro-corporate aspect of BSD, that's pretty clear to me, because of how extensively corporations were able to mine BSD code for shareholder benefit.

So, yeah, with BSD, you might argue differently (for example, argue that corporate mining of BSD code is a side-effect), but there is no way to argue that GPL isn't pro-user.

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timschmidt 724 days ago
> GPL == freedom for the user. It's always been this way. This is nothing new. You cannot, with a straight face and at this point in the conversation, claim that you didn't know the goal of the GPL

Your words. My words indicate that I see both licenses and being pro-everyone.

> As far as the pro-corporate aspect of BSD, that's pretty clear to me, because of how extensively corporations were able to mine BSD code for shareholder benefit.

Mining is an ecologically destructive activity which bears no resemblance to using software under the terms which it was licensed.

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