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by juunpp 550 days ago
No? The point is to keep the user's system free of non-free dependencies. As a user, I don't want to audit the several hundred packages that a single Rust application might decide to pull in; I'd prefer if such a thing were enforced instead. Otherwise, you might as well go use any of the hundreds of non-free distributions out there.

The Rust/Cargo license is also terrible grounds on which to build a free system anyway.
2 comments
duskwuff 550 days ago
The user could use a web browser to download non-free software. Is that grounds for disabling the ability to download files?

(You should have no trouble thinking of a couple more reductio-ad-absurdum examples, like wget, gcc, or a text editor.)

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juunpp 546 days ago
Strawman, what is absurd is your own reduction. Hopefully you see the difference between running a build/install command that pulls 100+ dependencies from the network that may change any moment without notice versus downloading a standalone software package that is appropriately licensed.

(You should have no trouble peering at the depths of your own stupidity.)

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p_l 550 days ago
... Not sure if such modification is not incompatible with GPL family of licenses, though, but I am not a lawyer (you're not allowed to combine GPL-licensed product, whether v2 or v3, in ways that create derivative works whose parts are licensed with more constraints than enforced by the GPL, with special carveouts for AGPL)
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