Mark Rafn <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > Jerome, some of the responses you've gotten have been dismissive of your > opinion, and a lot of this is normal debian-legal style. I hope you don't > take it too personally.
Thanks for considering my opinions. I don't think they counts here for a future decision anyway. But I'd be please to see people answering and enlightening me. > > I would like to understand your position better. I'm pretty sure I don't > agree with you, but it's not clear exactly what you want Debian to decide > with respect to the following: > > 1) Are works under the GFDL with invariant sections free? It depends on 2) If documentation is software then no. > 2) Can Debian usefully distinguish documentation from software? This is the point I would like to be convienced about. > 3) If so, is there a different set of criteria which should be used to > test the freedom of documentation as opposed to software? I know nothing of the publishing world. This is the reason why I cannot accept blindly any decision. I don't have the impression of writing code when I write documentation or speeches (cf etc files in Emacs). Why? > 4) Should Debian include (in main) non-free works if they're not software? Hasn't it be the case in the past with some documentations? > And some more specific questions, which I don't think have been asked > directly, as most d-l posters assume "no" to be obvious. > > 5) is everything from the FSF free by definition, even if the license > would be non-free for someone else? > 6) should Debian grant special status to the FSF and allow non-free FSF > work to be part of Debian? 5) and 6) are interesting questions. This wouldn't be fair of course :-) > 7) should Debian leave useful stuff in the main archive even if it is > later determined to be non-free? Of course not :-) > On Tue, 13 May 2003, [iso-8859-15] Jérôme Marant wrote: >> Could we consider some invariant sections as "non-problematic"? > > This would seem to be issue #6. I'd say "no" for a lot of reasons, but > I'm happy to hear yours. For instance, does the GNU manifesto as invariant section hurt? >> >> But then, if we're seeking for enemies, I believe they >> >> are not on GNU side ... > > Quite agreed. I don't consider this to be seeking enemies, but rather > refusing to go along with a friend who is making a very bad mistake. Althought we can convince some random upstream author, do we have any chance about FSF manuals? >> Err, it is a regression isn't it? I've always considered it as part >> of Emacs, and even its online help. It has always worked like that. > > If it's part of emacs, then it's very clearly non-free software and the > whole thing should be removed from Debian (unless the FSF doesn't have to > follow everyone else's definition of freedom). "The whole thing"? Emacs itself? >> You mentioned in a previous mail packaging old versions of manuals. >> This is IMHO pretty useless because noone cares for outdated manuals. > > Some of us don't care for non-free manuals either. There are a number of > cases where I choose to use free software over non-free software that > meets my current needs somewhat better. I'm glad Debian helps me make > that choice, and I don't understand why documentation would be any > different. Probably because free equivalents of non-free docs are not likely to appear, unless those non-free docs get their license changed. People don't like writing docs. >> Althought people can be motivated in forking or reimplementing >> applications, I doubt anyone will be motivated enough to fork >> documentation and noone'll be able to be as up-to-date as the >> Emacs manual. > > I see the motivations as very similar. Did people suddenly decide to love writing docs? -- Jérôme Marant http://marant.org
