Date: Sun, 25 Feb 2001 01:05:59 -0800 From: "Ted Mittelstaedt" <tedm@toybox.placo.com> To: "Laurence Berland" <stuyman@confusion.net>, "David Johnson" <djohnson@acuson.com> Cc: "Terry Lambert" <tlambert@primenet.com>, <freebsd-advocacy@FreeBSD.ORG> Subject: RE: Stallman stalls again Message-ID: <002201c09f0a$2b5d5480$1401a8c0@tedm.placo.com> In-Reply-To: <3A985559.6E0F6265@confusion.net>
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I think the premise of BSD is that it is the minimum that the law requires to prevent the University of California from being sued for providing faulty software. :-) Your going out on a limb when you read much more than that into the BSD license. The GNU License, unlike the BSD license, was written for a _political_ end. The BSD license was written for an _operations_ end, ie: purely because it's necessary to have a disclaimer to protect yourself from fools with foolish lawyers. GNU comes from a Jihad/Philosophical/Religious viewpoint, and it's primary purpose is to _have_an_effect_ on the thing that the license's author applies it to. BSD comes from a Minimalist/CYA/Practicality viewpoint, and it's primary purpose is to _prevent_ the thing that it's applied to from having an effect on the license's author. The assumption both licenses make is that the thing that they are being applied to, has the capability of taking on a life of it's own. The GPL attempts to influence what that life may be and use this influence to propagate it's viewpoint of how the software market should operate. By contrast, the BSD license doesen't attempt to influence what that life may be, as long as it isn't used against the creator. Much is made of the idea that BSD is in opposition to GPL, but I think this is false. A truly opposite license to GPL is what you would call a standard Commercial Software License. Commercial licenses block redistribution, and mandate that updates to the code to be kept private Ted Mittelstaedt tedm@toybox.placo.com Author of: The FreeBSD Corporate Networker's Guide Book website: http://www.freebsd-corp-net-guide.com >-----Original Message----- >From: owner-freebsd-advocacy@FreeBSD.ORG >[mailto:owner-freebsd-advocacy@FreeBSD.ORG]On Behalf Of Laurence Berland >Sent: Saturday, February 24, 2001 4:44 PM >To: David Johnson >Cc: Terry Lambert; freebsd-advocacy@FreeBSD.ORG >Subject: Re: Stallman stalls again > > > > >David Johnson wrote: > >> Bingo! The premise of the GPL is that the user is prone to immorality >> and unreason. The premise of the BSDL is that the user is competent, >> rational and moral. And this attitude isn't lost on the user. Case in >> point: Steve Jobs only released the NeXT Objective C front end under the >> GPL because he was threatened by legal action, but he released Darwin >> under the APSL and donated lots back to FreeBSD >> _without_even_being_asked_to! >> > >To clarify, I think it's less that the BSDL assumes all users are >competent, rational, and moral, than it assumes that people taken as a >whole do, such that a small portion lacking in these traits can't manage >to do serious harm, and that it's worth the small setbacks they'll >create in order to realize the larger benefits that essentially >unlimited pooling of human thought vis a vis the collaborative process >will bring. GPL just ties people up in red tape, and doesn't give them >a choice. People always get angry when they don't have a choice, and >usually will choose the opposing view (this is perfectly rational, it >makes it easier to demonstrate that you don't agree with what's being >forced on you, and it makes a clear protest). Given the choice to do >whatever they want, most people (and hence society at large) will do the >right thing. > >> David >> >> >Laurence Berland >Intern, Flooz.com >Northwestern '04 >stuyman@confusion.net >http://www.isp.northwestern.edu/~laurence > >"The world has turned and left me here" > >To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org >with "unsubscribe freebsd-advocacy" in the body of the message > To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-advocacy" in the body of the message
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