Richard Stallman wrote:
Yes. "Debian will remain 100% free software". That's the first line of the
Debian Social Contract. This means that everything in Debian must be free
*software*.
That is one possible interpretation, but since it is based on
asserting that manuals, essays, licenses, and logos are software, I
think it is not the proper one.
We hope to show you the error of your ways. ;-)
I think the text was written without
regard to the presence of material other than software in the
distribution, and it ought to be interpreted in that light.
Bruce Perens has clarified that the DFSG was intended to apply to
everything on the Debian CD. I don't think you're right about this.
It has been made clear *many* times that the interpretation of
"software" generally used here is "the part of the computer which is not
hardware". This is the original and more accurate meaning of
"software". Manuals, essays, licenses, and logos *encoded as bits on a
computer* are software. A carving of a program on a stone tablet is not
software. Accordingly there is nothing in the Debian distribution which
is not software.
But let us suppose, for the sake of argument, that we accept your
interpretation. I still see no reason to believe that documentation
should be treated differently from programs with regard to freedom.
Several good reasons have been given to treat it exactly the same way,
many related to the difficulty of separating documentation entirely from
programs, and the desirability of not separating it.
If you really have good, specific reasons to treat it differently in
such a way that Invariant Sections are OK for documentation and not for
programs, do tell; I haven't heard any.