On 04/01/2016 10:04 PM, J.B. Nicholson wrote: > > Currently this program is listed because it "Only runs/supports > proprietary software.". Given what Joshua Gay said in > https://lists.nongnu.org/archive/html/gnu-linux-libre/2016-03/msg00039.html > "Only runs/supports proprietary software" is an inadequate reason to > exclude Mac-on-Linux because (as Gay says) there are "Good reasons to be > able to run proprietary software".
Nothing I wrote in the email you are quoting is applicable to this situation. First and foremost, in that email I sent, I stated that free distros SHOULD NOT package and distribute MAME. I suggested in that email that it might be possible to produce a fork of MAME that a free distro could distribute. I provided some suggestions on some steps that should be taken in producing a fork. The hypothetical package produced from such a fork may or may not be something we would want to include in free distros. I stated that the fork of the program should recommend only free programs/ROMs to users of the program and I said it should not recommend running any proprietary programs. If there are no free programs to recommend at all, then it might be the case that a free distro should not distribute such a package. The section you did quote the title of "good reasons to be able to run proprietary programs" is a complicated one. One important remark I made prefacing all of my comments in that email was this: "Please keep in mind that my comments here are not necessarily all generally applicable to modern systems and programs that are currently in use. In many cases my comments might make sense when discussing a computer program that is 38 years old but might not be as applicable to some new software designed for modern computers." This point matters. A 38 year old arcade ROM for which we may actually have the complete and corresponding source code is a weird edge case to be considered. When thinking about unusual and weird situations like that, we should do so with care and consideration. It doesn't mean that our conclusion at the end of the day will be that we go ahead and recommend people download and run such ROMs if they are in fact proprietary. However, there is value in thinking through the motivations or reasons a person might have in wanting to run such ROMs as well as at the same time thinking through and strategizing about how old, archived proprietary programs might be able to be turned into old, archived free software programs. In my email, this was also something I discussed. -- Joshua Gay Licensing & Compliance Manager <http://www.fsf.org/licensing> Free Software Foundation <https://donate.fsf.org> GPG key ID: 8DA625BB What's a GPG key ID? See our Email Self-Defense Guide: <https://emailselfdefense.fsf.org>
