[vox-tech] [OT] The AFPL (was: some PDF problems: screen and print rendering do not match)

[Peter Jay Salzman]

On Wed 11 Aug 04, 10:24 AM, Micah J. Cowan <@.> said:
> On Wed, Aug 11, 2004 at 10:13:07AM -0400, Peter Jay Salzman wrote:
> 
> > 
> > Freshmeat thinks the AFPL is free:
> > 
> >    http://freshmeat.net/browse/826/
> > 
> > It's also good enough for sourceforge:
> > 
> >    http://sourceforge.net/projects/ghostscript/
> > 
> > However, it's NOT good enough for OSI.  But that's not surprising.
> > OSI's definition of open source was written by the same person who wrote
> > the DFSG.  He was probably one of the first people to belong to Debian
> > legal.
> 
> I don't see where freshmeat or sourceforge declares this license free,
> in the links above.

I think you're right.  As Rick pointed out, I probably mis-spoke.

> Other that, though, I agree with your assertion that AFPL is not at
> all a bad license, and if it is different from "free", it is at least
> not different in ways that truly impact the user's rights in
> significant ways.
> 
> The one problem with the "nobody charges but the author" is: who is
> the author?  If 10% of the code in a modified work is original, what
> of the right of the modifier to charge for his work?
 
Heh.  I wondered about this too when I read the license.  I'm quite
curious about how the designer of the AFPL proposed for that to work.

> I agree with the writers of the AFPL that the problem with free/open
> source licenses is that they restrict the ability of the developers to
> be fairly compensated for their work. RMS talks about making money
> through service and what not (and for some few companies, this may be
> a workable model), but that really is a distraction from the issue:
> you're still not being paid for all the work you did on your project,
> but only for the work you did /after/ it.
> 
> Ultimately, free software operates on the "rights of the user is king"
> paradigm, whilst typical proprietary EULAs focus on "rights of the
> developer is king". There really doesn't seem to be a way to resolve
> this practically: I agree with RMS that users should have all, or at
> least most, of the rights he states in his manifesto. I also believe
> that a worker should be compensated for his labor. Ultimately, I
> believe there are times when the developer's rights must take
> precedence, and there are also times when the user's rights ought to
> be upheld: but I do believe the ultimate choice ought to be in the
> hands of the person who created the thing. My creation, my choice. You
> don't like it, you can always do what GNU did and rewrite it
> yourself. Although then I still don't get compensated for the /design/
> work I did that you probably copied.
> 
> What I love most about the GPL and Free Software is that it ultimately
> comes down to "loving your fellow man" and "putting others first". It
> is a completely unselfish action to license a piece of software under
> a free license, and I love that. But I don't think it's right to
> demand that everyone else work without any self-interest: it's a "good
> deed" that you must choose to make yourself; a personal decision.
 
I think this is a really, really nice way of putting it.  But it also
makes you wonder how David Dawes would chime in on this converation.  I
just saw this today.  It's very sad:

   http://xfree86.org/distros/

Many people pointed to X11 as being even more free than the GPL.
Compared to the BSD and MIT, the GPL is downright encumbered.

In a few short months, David Dawed turned xfree86 into a ghostland.
They now have to advertise a user base of "Buffalo Linux" and "Peanut
Linux".  There's talk of the last major distro, NetBSD of switching to
x.org.

Anyway, I think that was very nicely said, Micah.

Pete

-- 
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