> > Because the requirement for main is that it satisfy all of our free > > software guidelines. As I understand it, GFDL does not properly satisfy > > guideline #3.
On Fri, Jan 23, 2004 at 03:55:52PM +1000, Anthony Towns wrote: > It's a requirement that all the programs in main satisfy the requirements > of the DFSG. At present it's not a requirement that the text of copyright > licenses, or documentation satisfy the requirements of the DFSG. Guideline #3 never mentions "programs". > > > > > Personally, I think that's harmful: independent issues should be voted > > > > > on separately; and afaics the editorial changes and the substantive > > > > > changes are independent. > > > > What defines independence? > > > The decision you make on one doesn't affect the decision you make on > > > the other. > > Taken literally, that means what's written in the proposal is by > > definition not independent. > > Taken pedantically, perhaps. The independent questions are "what does > the social contract need to say about non-free", and "how should the > social contract be written". How it's written and what it needs to say have significant overlap. > You can answer all aspects of the second question without knowing the > answer to the first, except one: "how should the social contract address > the issue of non-free". Well, in the sense that your "except one" is your first question. Yeah, it's true that the intersection of A and B has nothing in common with B except for what's in A. > > > > > At the moment the substantive options that have been discussed are: > > > > > [ ] Drop non-free > > > > > [ ] Limit non-free to partially-DFSG-free software > > > > > < > Keep non-free as is (unproposed) > > > > > while there are a whole raft of possible editorial changes. > > > > Even on that axis, there's more involved than that. > > > Really? I haven't seen any of it. Would you care to expound? > > The descriptive text in the social contract which defines our relationship > > with non-free software. > > That sentence no verb. Right. That was the expanded "it". > What about it? You're changing the text, but what are you doing that'll > actually change how we behave? Hopefully, not a whole lot, other than avoiding a few arguments. Maybe encourage people to be a bit more productive, but my basic plan is to fix problems based on existing practice. > > > Providing *more* text makes it *easier* to lost the important details. > > > If you're really making more substantive changes than the one above, this > > > has already happened. > > The problem which I think needs to be addressed is that people can > > mis-interpret the social contract to think that it's saying we shouldn't > > distribute non-free. > It's easy to point anyone who thinks that to point five of the social > contract. And you get responses like Andrew's proposal to drop point five of the social contract. > I don't think that changing the wording of the social contract will cause > anyone who thinks we shouldn't distribute non-free to change their mind. I do. Though I agree that my current proposal still doesn't address all the relevant points. > > > A lot of your changes are trying to clarify the description of our goals. > > Yes, exactly. > > > Andrew's proposal is to *change* our goals. > > Yes. > > > Those are different issues. > > They're not independent issues. > Yes, they are. They're as independent as saying "Let's change > our goals." and "Let's describe our goals in French insteasd of > English". Certainly you can't do the latter if you don't know what our > goals are; but that does not make the underlying issues dependant. Even in your example, if the motive for "Let's change our goals" is "because they're not described in French", they're still not independent. > >> Whether or not we want to clarify or clean up the social contract is an > >> issue > >> that's entirely separate to whether or not we want to drop non-free. > > I think that the reason people want to drop non-free is at least in part > > because of the way the social contract expresses our goals. > > Again, I think you're wrong. Can you point to anyone who has argued > for dropping non-free, but will say "Let's keep non-free" if the social > contract is reworded? Can you point to anyone who'd vote: No, but I can point at people who will point at the wording of the social contract when asked why they don't think we should distribute non-free. > [ 1 ] Keep non-free, make minor edits to social contract to clean > up apparent contradiction, with no substantive changes? > [ 2 ] Drop non-free, drop non-free from social contract > [ 3 ] Keep non-free, keep social contract as is > > if given the choice to do other editorial changes later? It's extremely difficult to get people to talk about their motivations. Furthermore, until I can present edits which people can recognize as being straightforward restatements of the social contract and existing practice, people who believe the social contract says something else are going to at best be highly dubious that the equivalency exists. > > Anyways, there's nothing stopping you from proposing "goals only" > > amendments. > > As I've already said to Branden and Andrew; I think it's better to discuss > why we want to do things, what we should do and how we do it, before > actually doing anything. I'm well aware that I can propose amendments. And how do you propose that happen? It's extremely difficult to get people to talk about their motivations. > > If you're truly only describing goals, not changes to any > > foundation documents, your proposals would be free of a significant > > hurdle which both my proposal and Andrew's proposal must face (the 3:1 > > supermajority requirement). > > > > Note also that I'm not claiming that you're wrong for believing that > > a "Goals Only" proposal is a good thing. If you have a clear vision > > of what that proposal should be, I highly recommend you write it up. > > I might even vote for it. > > Andrew's current proposal is *exactly* what a "goals only" proposal > should look like. It states what he wants to happen, and the minimum > number of changes to other things that need to be approved for it to > happen in a consistent manner. And he's provided no rationale for his changes. If that's exactly what you're advocating, I think I'm going to have to confess that I really don't know what you're advocating. > (Well, perfect but for the usual provisos about not dealing with contrib > at all) That, and he's proposing specific actions. If specific actions are goals, I don't see why different specific actions (which happen to include the exact wording of the social contract) are not goals. However, it's probably that I'm just missing your point. > > However, *I* don't have a clear vision of what that should be -- the > > problem I see is one of ambiguous language in the social contract. > > And that's the problem I'm trying to address. > > That's fine; Andrew's trying to address it too. Conflating it with the > debate about whether our goals themselves should change isn't sensible > though. I don't understand your basis for this statement. > > That you don't even > > recognize this as a problem doesn't really convince me that I should > > cease my approach. > > I think it's a problem -- important documents should be simple to read, > and shouldn't seem to contradict themselves when analysed. > > But I simply don't think it's a factor in the question of whether we > want to keep non-free or not. And I do. > (If it _is_ a factor, then, like Andrew has, we should make the minimum > number of changes to remedy whatever that problem is) Even if that problem is poor grammar? -- Raul
