Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S1760094AbXFQOGx (ORCPT ); Sun, 17 Jun 2007 10:06:53 -0400 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id S1756038AbXFQOGq (ORCPT ); Sun, 17 Jun 2007 10:06:46 -0400 Received: from mailout03.sul.t-online.com ([194.25.134.81]:36786 "EHLO mailout03.sul.t-online.com" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1755365AbXFQOGp (ORCPT ); Sun, 17 Jun 2007 10:06:45 -0400 Message-ID: <46753FB8.1010800@t-online.de> Date: Sun, 17 Jun 2007 16:05:44 +0200 From: Bernd Schmidt User-Agent: Thunderbird 2.0.0.0 (X11/20070519) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Alexandre Oliva CC: Linus Torvalds , Al Viro , Alan Cox , Ingo Molnar , Daniel Hazelton , Greg KH , debian developer , david@lang.hm, Tarkan Erimer , linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org, Andrew Morton Subject: Re: Dual-Licensing Linux Kernel with GPL V2 and GPL V3 References: <20070614195517.GA4933@elte.hu> <20070614235004.GA14952@elte.hu> <20070615011012.6c09066e@the-village.bc.nu> <20070615012623.GA25189@elte.hu> <20070615101007.0cbfd078@the-village.bc.nu> <4673CA7C.5040207@t-online.de> <20070616181902.GB21478@ftp.linux.org.uk> In-Reply-To: X-Enigmail-Version: 0.95.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-ID: XV5srmZ1QefEMM-l96Ykir358d-zSZ2vJJCeibbEfDAlUIUVte76cN X-TOI-MSGID: c71ada43-8bc2-41f5-883f-91d0f680ed17 Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Content-Length: 1759 Lines: 38 Alexandre Oliva wrote: > On Jun 17, 2007, Linus Torvalds wrote: >> No. You've explained one thing only: that you cannot see that people don't >> *agree* on the "spirit". > > They don't have to. > > Just like nobody but you can tell why you chose the GPLv2, nobody but > RMS can tell why he wrote the GPL. And the intent behind writing the > GPL is what defines its spirit. Given that a number of people who don't buy into FSF ideology (let's call them "open source proponents" to contrast them with the "free software people") have concluded that the GPLv2 achieves their personal goals, and have chosen the GPLv2 as the license for their projects, I'd argue that the spirit that is embodied in the GPLv2 is actually a larger thing than what the FSF intended, and more inclusive. When these same people now disagree with the GPLv3, it indicates that something has been lost, and the spirit of the _license_ has changed. The _intention_ behind writing the license may or may not have been the same (who can tell, after 20-odd years?), but this is separate from the spirit embodied in the license itself - the latter has, in my mind anyway, clearly been changed. You might prefer to say "clarified", but it comes down to the same thing. But personally, I find the discussion about whether the spirit changed or not somewhat beside the point and not very interesting. What's really going to cause problems is the fact that the actual wording took a turn for the worse. Bernd - To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/