[Wolves] FOSS, who's it for? Us or them?

Christopher Fox chris at robotninja.net
Thu Sep 25 10:52:08 UTC 2008


On 9/25/08, dick_turpin <dick_turpin at archlinux.us> wrote:
> Some poor individual spent time writing the code hopefully within the
> Linux community they released the code probably expecting other Linux or
> FOSS people to use it and or improve on it.

Well if that was actually the case, why didn't they release it under a
licence which said that? I for one am reluctant to assume that FOSS
developers are stupid, and the only other assumption is that the terms
of the licence used accurately represents what they want.

This argument is exactly why there is a myriad of different "free"
licences, representing the full spectrum from the totally loose "I
don't care, do whatever you want with the code, just leave me the hell
alone" to "you must release any derivative works under EXACTLY THESE
TERMS or I'll eat your dog".

There's enough choice out there for devs to release their work under a
licence which accurately describes their wishes, so why are we
imposing your choices over theirs?

Chris
-- 
And now, for something completely different...
chris at robotninja.net



More information about the Wolves mailing list