Re: [gentoo-dev] License criteria for Gentoo

[mike]

> That criterion is not quite enough to achieve the stated goal, because
> Licenses approved by the OSI are not necessarily Free Software
> licenses.  As a result, this criterion allows Gentoo to include, and
> even depend on, programs that are not free software.  (See
> http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/apsl.html for an example.)

the definition of 'depending on' was stated almost perfectly imho by
Mikko.  by 'almost' i mean `emerge system` is affected by what the
user puts into their USE variable.  a better list of packages that Gentoo
will 'depend' on can be found in your profile.  if you run this:
`grep '^*' /etc/make.profile/packages` you will see exactly what Gentoo
'depends' on.  now, this list contains packages that are both open source
and free.  that means everything Gentoo 'depends' on is open source and
free software.

as for 'allowing Gentoo to include programs that are not free software',
then thats just tooooooooooo freakin bad imo.  i want to play UT2003,
you going to tell me i cant ?  (insert other packages that fall under this
criteria).

> Would you please consider changing your criterion to refer to both the
> OSI and the FSF, so that licenses must qualify as both free software
> and open source?

maybe for the section that Gentoo wont depend on, but if you're want to
say Gentoo will never include software under such strict requirements,
then piss off ;)

> (If you would call the system Gentoo GNU/Linux, that would help us
> also.  See http://www.gnu.org/gnu/why-gnu-linux.html.)

while i completely agree with software being open and free, i hate to see
this kind of name change.  it just rubs me the wrong way, and i know i'll
never ever (reduce for emphasis ;]) use the phrase 'GNU/Linux' unless
i'm quoting somebody
-mike