Dr. Seuss, licensing, and WINE

[Rick Romero]

On Fri, 2002-02-08 at 13:41, Dimitrie O. Paun wrote:
> On Fri, 8 Feb 2002, Rick Romero wrote:
> 
> > What is being proposed will affect ALL users of WINE, not just those who
> > contribute.  Immediately dismissing someone because they havn't
> > contributed to WINE is short-sighted at best.
> 
> What are you taking about? There are many users of xGPL software -- they
> will not care a bit about the license. All we should be concerned in the
> present discussion is what license is most beneficial to Wine. Period.

Exactly.  The users don't care what license Wine is using, they care
about what works on their PC's.  Look at the companies who are poviding
Wine services:

CodeWeavers:  Easy Wine Installation, custom code, Win Browser plugin
Lindows.com:  Easy to use, Windows compatible Linux distro
Transgaming:  Windows Game support within Linux

These companies are beneficial to Wine.  USERS are the target of these
companies.  These companies need to make money.  It was said in another
post that Wine has zero value without value added options.  That's just
one perspective. If wine works for you now, it has value.  If it only
works for you when it's from one of these companies, it doesn't have
value until something has been added to it.  Value is a perceived
quantity.  You may think it has value simply because you've put time
into it.

Now we could go on and on about value-added services.  Probably the
biggest thing these guys offer is convienance.  Most of us on this list
could duplicate some of what they've done, thereby removing their value
(in our perception).

The real question is, what license doesn't discourage (yes, double
negative, quality buniess term :) companies from throwing resources at
Wine?  I assume that a license change (at least from current to LGPL)
would only affect businesses.  In that case, as much as you guys would
hate to hear it, maybe you should ask BUSINESSES, who aren't already
prominent, what they would prefer to work under, and why.  Don't guess,
go to the source.

I DON'T KNOW which license is "better", but I believe if you ignore what
the users want, or deter someone else from bringing what the users want,
your product will lose out in the end.


> 
> --
> Dimi.
> 
> 
> 
-- 
Rick Romero
IT Manager	ph: 262.685.4841
Valeo, Inc.	fax: 262.695.4850
rick at valeoinc.com