On Tue, May 26, 2026 at 3:20 PM Jim Hall <[email protected]> wrote: > > On Tue, May 26, 2026 at 2:39 PM Wilhelm Spiegl wrote: > > > hi Jim, > > Use a translator or ai to read this. It says that the california problem > > has changed. > > > > I saw that update earlier today in my tech news feed, and I've been > looking at it. For reference, here's the link to the California bill > being moved forward: > > https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=202520260AB1856 > > Assembly Bill 1856 (AB 1856) has been proposed, and is now working its > way through the Assembly. If passed, it will amend the AB 1043 "Age > verification signals" law, which we discussed on this list earlier > this year. Here's a link to AB 1043: > https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=202520260AB1043 > [..] > > This is a much better situation for all open source projects, > including FreeDOS and Linux. If they pass this updated version, that > means (j)(2) would exclude FreeDOS from this stupid age verification > law.
I'm still concerned that the definition of "app store" remains unchanged in Section 1: :: (g) (1) “Covered application store” means a publicly available :: internet website, software application, online service, or platform that :: distributes and facilitates the download of applications from third-party :: developers to users of a computer, a mobile device, or any other general :: purpose computing that can access a covered application store or can :: download an application. :: :: (2) “Covered application store” does not mean an online service or :: platform that distributes extensions, plug-ins, add-ons, or other software :: applications that run exclusively within a separate host application. That definition in (g)(1) doesn't mean you have to *buy* apps from that app store (free apps are a thing) only that it's "a publicly available internet website" that "distributes and facilitates the download of applications from third-party developers to users of a computer." Does that definition apply to the FreeDOS files archive at Ibiblio? As written, I'm not sure. I think a reasonable person would interpret "app store" as something that has a front-end to "facilitate" the download (and install) of apps from third-party developers. So a website like Ibiblio (on its own) probably wouldn't apply. Does that definition apply to a web repository that a network-aware package manager would provide a front-end to? I don't know. I'm curious to see what different Linux distributions say about it. For example, I run Fedora Linux, and I can run 'sudo dnf list --available' and see that I can install a game like Hedgewars, and then I can install it with 'sudo dnf install hedgewars'. The package itself is on Fedora's "packages" repository website: (although it takes some clicking to actually find the "download" link) https://packages.fedoraproject.org/pkgs/hedgewars/hedgewars/ As a parallel example, you can tell FDNPKG16 to "install this package" and FDNPKG16 downloads and installs that package for you. Does the front-end command (dnf or FDNPKG16) make the repository an "app store" under the law? I hope not (that would be very stupid) but we know that the people who drafted the original AB 1043 weren't thinking about open source. But maybe they can change that before January 1. If anyone here lives in California, I encourage you to contact your state rep. _______________________________________________ Freedos-devel mailing list [email protected] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
