BSD, Gav, LGPL, Jeremy, and business

Patrik Stridvall ps at leissner.se
Fri Feb 15 16:07:33 CST 2002


> On Fri, 15 Feb 2002, Patrik Stridvall wrote:
> 
> > Still think that after reading my reply to Jeremy?
> 
> Yes, I do. 
> 
> Listen Patrik, in the past you seemed to be a reasonable 
> person. Now you
> are indistingushible from a troll. Really. It seems that whatever is
> argued, you have a psychotic tendency to invent a counter-argument, no
> matter how silly it is. 

Yes, I'm quite aware that some people consider my
tendency of almost never giving up irritating. :-)

But what do you expect me to do when I have a 
feeling that going to LGPL is a terrible mistake?

If you don't understand it if I explain it one way,
perhaps you will if I explain it another way,
of course often I hope invain...

> Now, that fun sometimes, but it has 
> gone too long,
> too often in this bitter thread. For this very reason I have 
> avoided to
> argue with you, but I will make this one exception, since the 
> thread has
> progressed past useful long time ago.

If you have made up your mind you have,
but I'm arguing for people that haven't.
 
> > Very true and this significantly weakens any "protection"
> > that the LGPL offers.
> 
> Which is a feature, and which should silence all reasonable BSD
> supporters. 

BSD has the same feature so when comparing pros and cons this
certainly doesn't weight in favour LGPL.

> The ones that are left, simply ignore this very 
> important FACT
> (It's emphesised since I don't want to argue it, let's assume 
> it for the
> purpose of this discussion).

Their is nothing to argue, BSD has the same feature.

Obviously we should concerntrate on the relative pros and cons.
  
> > Perhaps, but at a terrible price. Read my reply to Jeremy.
> 
> Crap. What terrible price, WTF are you guys smoking, 'cause I 
> want some of
> it! Once again: Wine is isomorphous to a Linux distribution. They are
> growing MUCH faster than Wine ever did. They have a lot of commercial
> backers. 

No Wine is not isomorphous to a Linux distribution.
Wine will be an essential part of EXISTING
Linux distribution. Sure there might be a market for
new specialized ones like Lindows but don't have to
large hopes.

I'm sure there will be Linux distributions willing to
offer proprietary extension to Wine if some company
offers it. 

There is nothing strange about that, some
distributions already bundle proprietary applications.

> Stop this stupid, idiotic, "LGPL will kill all
> business" argument.

I have never said, that LGPL will kill all business models,
now you are claiming things I never said. There are
some people, none named, none forgotten in the BSD camp
that he made similar claims, but please don't make me
guilty by association.

I have said that it will limit the possible business models
severly. For example read Gavriels first reply or for that
matter read my last reply to Jeremy again.

Since the LGPL removes the work protection that the work
have from copyright, it is almost essential that you
get assurances that you get paid before doing the work.
This is in most markets called contracting.
  
> > Somehow you seem to believe that all reasonable business models
> > will strictly following DLL boundaries, but you have given.
> > absolutely no proof of this, you just assume it.
> 
> Patrick, you are incorrigible. Yes, our purpose in choosing a 
> license is
> not to support as many business models as possible. No. It is 
> to find a
> licence that _overall_ is best for Wine.

My point is that since the Microsoft DLL in general have no
clear design the LGPL will articially for no good reason
prevent some business models that you otherwise have been
possible.

This means that Microsoft arbitrary choices will prevent
many otherwise possible business models. Is that good?

Of course this requires that Alexandres analysis of the
LGPL is correct, if he is not, you will lose most of
the rest of the protection that the LGPL might provides.

In that case you will have Wine under a close to
meaningless license that will potentially scare away
people not wishing to try their luck in court.

> Now, we all agree that some
> commercial involvment is good. The question is, how much? All possible
> one? Like everything is life, the answer must lie in the 
> middle, not at
> axtreme. 

Obviously. I have never claimed anything else.

> So we must sacrifice a few business models to 
> benefit Wine. It's
> just fare. An LGPL licence will keep most of them still 
> viable (such as
> TransGaming, for example). WTF is your problem with it?

My biggest problem is that because of way Microsoft
have designed the Windows the sacrifice will be
complete arbitrary.

I'm not entirely against some sort of "copyleft",
that is why I in my debate with David Elliot
proposed that we could possibly have a license that
makes it clear that linking to proprietry libraries
are allowed. Possible we could add some paragraph
about that the functionality must be a seperate
part of DLL in some way.

I don't really like it, but you were speaking
about compromises....




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