[sclug] Cheap'n'nasty Tesco Linux machines

[mail@europa.demon.co.uk]

On Saturday 15 March 2008 12:11:06 Simon Huggins wrote:
> On Sat, Mar 15, 2008 at 10:42:14AM +0000, Phillip Chandler wrote:
> > So if the two rodneys who said the two comments up top, if you wanna get
> > moralistic, fine, thats your privilege. I on the the hand dont give a
> > rats arse if I use closed source, copyright software / drivers. Thats
> > the freedom of choice, and if it means my computers work perfectly for
> > me, then tough luck, Im using the non free closed source alternatives.
> > Thats why you have the media repos (especially for ubuntu) because
> > enough people have the same attitude as me.
>
> Hi, I am apparently one of the "rodneys".
>
> > > Copyright is evil and morally and ethically wrong.
>
> My point was that copyright is required for Free Software (the licences
> depend on it) in the same way that it's required for proprietary
> software.  Saying it's "evil and morally and ethically wrong" doesn't
> show much understanding of software licensing issues.

As a "rodney" (please retract that if we are to continue any discussion) I 
understand "licensing" perfectly well, I simply consider it morally and 
ethically wrong, and I can inform you that copyright is not required for Free 
Software, it is merely a mechanism (the "copyright hack" to turn it into 
copyleft) which we use under the current legal system that recognises 
copyright to enable Free Software in the society we live in today.

We can equally easily legislate that anyone distributing software must provide 
to the recipient the source code to that software, and that there may be no 
restriction placed on how that can be used by the recipient. This is 
perfectly normal regulatory control to prevent abuse of buyers by vendors; 
indeed copyright itself is an equally artificial though perhaps not 
justifiable statutory monopoly imposed by government...

>
> But you're misrepresenting my views when you say I'm getting moralistic.
> I really don't mind what you run.  I like Free Software and I tend to
> choose it in preference to proprietary software when it works but I'm
> pragmatic.

Many do just that... However, we may choose as a society to disallow the 
concept that information and ideas can be owned, just as we once decided that 
persons could not be owned, and that women should vote...

For anyone who doesn't give a "rat's arse" about morals and ethics, and 
is "pragmatic" ... Good luck to you, I cannot live that way myself.

Welcome to the 21st century!