Michael K. Edwards writes: > On 8/1/05, Michael Poole <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >> All rambling and ad hominem attacks aside, DFSG analysis is not at all >> about risk; it is about determining whether or not the license imposes >> non-free restrictions or requirements on licensees. Argument from >> authority will not change that, particularly since it is unclear that >> anyone has -- or will ever have -- relevant experience in law or >> fiduciary duty you specified. > > One man's rambling is another man's grounding in real-world law. As > for "ad hominem attacks", I did say that "not all debian-legal > participants deserve to be tarred with that brush" -- so it's only an > attack on _you_ if you think that "ideologues with brazen contempt for > real-world law" fits _you_. (The "self-selected" and "no fiduciary > relationship" bits are, I think, uncontroversial -- does anyone here > feel like asserting that they are legally liable for the consequences > of decisions influenced by d-l discussions?) I did have a couple of > conspicuous individuals in mind, and you were not one of them; if you > can't think of anyone around here whom the shoe fits a lot better than > it fits you, my apologies. > > In any case, if you want to say that risk management is outside "DFSG > analysis" (whatever that is), that's fine; but then you shouldn't be > equating "DFSG-free" with "OK, ftpmasters, let it into the archive". > A formalist attitude towards the DFSG, in which every objection to an > upload has to map into one of its clauses, would probably even strike > Justice Clarence Thomas as taking strict constructionism a little too > far. Call citations to the actual law in one jurisdiction or another > "argument from authority" if you like, but if that kind of authority > isn't relevant to debian-legal then I hope that debian-legal isn't > very relevant to Debian.
I have not meant to equate DFSG freeness with what can go into Debian, but DFSG freeness is an important threshold issue. If my messages misled on that point, I apologize. There are other factors to consider, but this thread was originally about which changes were necessary to make the BitTorrent Open Source License DFSG-free, and I meant only to address that question. Michael Poole -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
