Date: Mon, 12 Jun 2000 11:02:46 -0700 From: David Johnson <djohnson@acuson.com> To: freebsd-newbies@freebsd.org Subject: BSD Advocacy... Message-ID: <394525C6.F3C84C5@acuson.com>
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Okay folks, opinion time! What's the best way to counter the continual FUD that the GPL protects software better than the BSD license? It's starting to annoy me that so many pundits point to a mere license as the sole reason why Linux is better than FreeBSD. My guess is that if they didn't focus on the license, they would have to focus on the software and sadly conclude that Linux is not necessarily superior to FreeBSD, Solaris or other quality unices. This FUD seems to have ramped up considerably since the Microsoft/Kerberos affair. One of the most persistant statements is "the GPL prevents people from stealing the code". Another common one that always raises my hackles is "the Linux kernel succeeded where BSD did not because of the GPL." Not only is this a subtle insult to the Linux coders, it also implies that the BSDs have failed. And then there was the email sent to my private address: "would you please release you software under the GPL so that I can use it?". We know that FreeBSD is not inferior to Linux. We know that the BSD license is 100% free. We know that different needs means different licenses. But how do we get this message out, and how do we get it out without denigrating Linux and the GPL at the same time? I have been correcting some of these misconceptions as I find them in various Linux forums, but I'm not sure that this is even useful or productive. Opinions? David To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-newbies" in the body of the message
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