Hello all, thanks to Ludovic for posting a first concrete suggestion! I agree with Mark's comments on removing the links, although I also think it was good to have them in the first version put up for comments - it helps with the bootstrapping process, showing that what is proposed is in line with the current GNU project.
What is missing, however, is, right at the beginning, a statement of mission; I think this is so because you essentially assumed it was understood as granted... I would put this as the very first paragraph, before the bullet list with more detailed points. Maybe something like this, inspired by the starting words on gnu.org, "What is GNU?" : "The purpose of the GNU project is to provide an entirely free operating system." I also like the next few sentences on gnu.org, which could be used to clarify the point about licenses: "The GNU operating system consists of GNU packages (programs specifically released by the GNU Project) as well as free software released by third parties." Then we could explain that GNU packages need to be released under copyleft licenses, while third party software only needs to be released under free licenses. But maybe this requires more discussion, since some of you seem to think that GNU should have a broader mission statement? I think we also need to define the terms "GNU something" more clearly. Above, we have "GNU project", "GNU operating system" and "GNU packages". For me, once a GNU social contract (and I really like the term, I think it is in line with Rousseau's concept!) has been installed, the "GNU project" are all the people who work on furthering the goal set up in the social contract, and who explicitly agreed to it. This includes all the people Brandon mentioned in his message. These would be the safeguards of the social contract. The "GNU operating system" is clear then, it is the system created and distributed by the GNU project. A "GNU package" would be one of the software packages created inside the GNU project, as opposed to the third party software that we also need to arrive at a complete operating system. The bullet points would then just serve for fleshing out the things. For instance, we need to give the definition of what we understand by "free". I think it would be good to explicitly copy-paste the four freedoms; these are really the core of the endeavour, and they are sufficiently concise. What do you think? I would volunteer to formulate in a few days a new version taking the discussion into account. Andreas