On Tue, 2006-02-14 at 23:28 +0100, Bernhard R. Link wrote: > Here we differ. There are just different definitions of what > software means. But this does not change the fact that freedom matters. > There are of course different forms of freedom needed for different > things.
I think you're probably right here, and one of the things the FDL didn't really get right was that it was attempting to treat the digital and non-digital forms of a work equally, when functionally they are not. > So there are many reasons to not make a distinguish between all those > bits contained in an OS by some undefinable criterias wheather they > cause the creation of something the CPU interprets (machine code) > or to be interpreted by something interpreted by the CPU (scripts) > one the one side, and things interpreted by something interpreted by the > CPU (images, texts, ...). I actually think you're confusing two issues here. The first is, is there some standard of freedom which should apply to all digital content? And the second is, assuming there is a standard, is it possible to apply it to any digital content? Let's assume the first part for convenience - let's say that we have some given standard of freedom, and that we think all digital content should be upheld to that standard. Is the second part true? I would say not - I don't believe it's possible to uphold a standard of freedom without distinguishing between "all those bits" ;). As an example, let's say I have a simple BSD-style licence which allows me to modify and redistribute a digital work. If I apply it to a digital photograph, is that photo free? I would say it pretty much is. However, if you apply that licence to an executable binary of Emacs (for example), I would say that is not free - sure, in theory I have the freedoms, but in practise without the source I'm stuffed. Both the photo and Emacs binary are "just a load of bits", but without distinguishing them somehow it's difficult to talk about whether one or the other is "free". I don't see how it's possible to say the photo is free, but the binary is not, without distinguishing them somehow. Because of this, I would find it difficult to talk about "free software" when "software" includes a variety of non-executable works - I believe it's over-generalisation. Cheers, Alex. _______________________________________________ Discussion mailing list Discussion@fsfeurope.org https://mail.fsfeurope.org/mailman/listinfo/discussion