Active State and the PSF

[Thomas Wouters]

On Sun, May 27, 2001 at 04:54:31AM +0000, Nick Perkins wrote:

[ Nick falls prey to the PSF's supreme marketing engine, and discovers the
  existance of the PSF! ]

> Is there any reason to be a little worried, or is it all good?
> Will Python stay free?

Besides what Tim and Martin already pointed out, namely that Guido wants
Python to stay free, I'd like to point out that the Python licence is an
Open Source licence, as well as a GPL compatible licence (as per Python
2.0.1, 2.1.1 and/or 2.2, whichever comes first.) That means that, until the
licence is changed, Python remains free. And even if the licence is changed,
versions of Python that were released with an OS-licence would remain open,
so you can always fork off your own 'Willy' project.

That said, the chance of this ever happening is very, very slim, because the
PSF is run by Python developers. Sponsor-members (basically corporations
that pay to get a vote in the PSF) have to be elected in by the seated
members, so a 'hostile takeover' is equally unlikely. The three Digital
Creations employees on the PSF Board of Directors might look scary on paper,
but since two of them are Tim Peters and Guido van Rossum, and Digital
Creations isn't the one who can replace them, it's *really* not an issue.
Besides, neither ActiveState nor Digital Creations, nor any of the other
companies that are being considered for corporate memberships, have any
reason to 'close down' Python.

And-you-can-trust-me--I'm-one-of-the-directors-too-<wink>-ly y'rs,
-- 
Thomas Wouters <thomas at xs4all.net>

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