Raul Miller wrote: > > But, if you're trying to produce free (aka non-proprietary) software I > > think the GPL winds up being the best license:
On Tue, May 16, 2000 at 12:43:41PM +0100, Dj wrote: > Or more accurately, if you are trying to induce people to produce free > software by licensing your software... Why "more accurately"? I can see this as a vaugely plausible goal, a secondary effect that probably won't happen. But I don't see it as more important than the freedom of the software being licensed. > > Then again, if your goal is to produce something proprietary, or > > potentially proprietary, the GPL is obviously a bad license to use. > > Or to produce something that is "aproprietary" - it doesn't care > wether it is owned or not. True. If you want to produce something that can be proprietary but doesn't have to be, then the GPL is a bad choice. > The BSD license has not stopped people doing proprietary development > or free development on BSD'd works. What operates there is the > economics of proprietary branching, where it's cheaper to work with > the community than develop alone. There is some truth to this. On the other hand, I'm personally responsible for a dozen BSD machines where I can't even look at the sources for the software running on machines. > The real question is do we want an open inclusive community or a > parallel-to - proprietary exclusive community. The real question is about a parallel? Frankly, that sounds more like a rhetorical question than anything else. I think that the real question is: should Motif be a standard which can be used in proprietary software. And, I think the answer to this is yes. > I'd like to see Motif opened with eventually a BSD license. And CDE > too... :) I have no problems with this. On the other hand, I think it is worth considering the possibility of dual-licensing Motif, with GPL and the original Motif license being choosable by the licensee. The issue here is: would this generate enough revenue to be worth bothering with? -- Raul
