The Industry choice

[Jeff Shannon]

Bulba! wrote:

> On Thu, 06 Jan 2005 08:39:11 GMT, Roel Schroeven
> <rschroev_nospam_ml at fastmail.fm> wrote:
> 
>>That's generally the goal of the Free Software Foundation: they think 
>>all users should have the freedom to modify and/or distribute your code. 
> 
> You have the freedom of having to wash my car then. ;-)

A more accurate analogy would be, "You're free to borrow my car, but 
if you do, you must wash it and refill the gas tank before you return it."

Note that the so-called 'viral' nature of GPL code only applies to 
*modifications you make* to the GPL software.  The *only* way in which 
your code can be 'infected' by the GPL is if you copy GPL source.

Given the standard usage of closed-source software, you never even 
have access to the source.  If you use GPL software in the same way 
that you use closed-source software, then the GPL cannot 'infect' 
anything you do.

The 'infective' nature of the GPL *only* comes when you make use of 
the *extra* privelidges that open source grants.  So yes, those extra 
privelidges come with a price (which is that you share what you've 
done); but if you don't want to pay that price, you have the choice of 
not using those privelidges.  This does not, in any way, prevent you 
from using GPL'ed software as a user.

(Problems may come if someone licenses a library under the GPL; that's 
what the LGPL was invented for.  But the issue here is not that the 
GPL is bad, it's that the author used the wrong form of it.)

Personally, I'm not a big fan of the GPL.  I'm much more likely to use 
BSD-ish licenses than [L]GPL.  But it still bugs me to see the GPL 
misrepresented as some plot to steal the effort of hardworking 
programmers -- it is, instead, an attempt to *encourage* hardworking 
programmers to share in a public commons, by ensuring that what's 
donated to the commons remains in the commons.

Jeff Shannon
Technician/Programmer
Credit International