On 05/12/2007, Michael Sparks <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > And that agrees with the premise of an /analogy/ of speech - "you should think > of free as in free speech, not as in free beer."(paragraph 2)
But the analogy is flawed because the freedoms are different. The freedom of speech is the freedom to express one's self without restriction. The four freedoms of the GPL are to do with modification/distribution/usage/opacity and are COMPLETELY DIFFERENT both practically and metaphorically. The GPL v3 does not restrict your freedom to "speak" the source code it restricts your freedom to remove the freedom to modify/distribute/use/study. > > Software is an act of creativity (like art or poetry) > > Poetry is speech. Yes, it's also a creative act. So say I write a poem called "Noah is awsum" and I licenced it under the GPL v3 all I would be doing is stopping you from removing the freedom to modify/distribute/use/study. I would not be restricting your freedom to recite the poem and hence the whole analogy to free speech is wrong. Vijay's argument is conflating the freedom to perform/speak/run with the freedom to alter further modification/distribution/usage/opacity. These two things are not the same, they're not even related. -- Noah Slater <http://bytesexual.org/> "Creativity can be a social contribution, but only in so far as society is free to use the results." - R. Stallman - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/
