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> Freedom is never a _loophole_, freedom is just freedom. By that standard, the only truly free "license" is the public domain. FSF and other license authors

> Freedom is never a _loophole_, freedom is just freedom. By that standard, the only truly free "license" is the public domain. FSF and other license authors have a different philosophical representation about what freedom means: we are not discussing the freedom of the person using the code (that is maximized simply by ceding him all intelectual rights, ideally with the exclusion of everybody else); we are concerned about the agregate impact the licenses have over the way society uses and engages with technology. That is such a broad topic, lending itself to such diverse political views, that it's impossible to say FSF or GPLv3 are "wrong" without acknowledging their premises and examining your own hidden political assumptions. (I use 'political' here in it's broadest sense, an attitude regarding the functioning of the society).

geofft 9y ago
The FSF has its own statement on what freedom means: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.en.html https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.en.html > The freedom to run the program as you wish, for any purpose (freedom 0). The AGPL denies recipients this freedom.
- thomasahle 9y ago
  >> The freedom to run the program as you wish, for any purpose (freedom 0). > The AGPL denies recipients this freedom. The disagreement here is of course about who the user is. If you are running the software on a server for others to use, you are not the user in the eyes of FSF. Luckily multiple licenses exist, so when you write a piece of software you get to decide what definition of user you want to grant freedoms to.
- cornholio 9y ago
  Applied to cloud computing, they would argue that the person running the software is actually the end-user and not the owners of the cloud.
- gregknicholson 9y ago
  >> The freedom to run the program as you wish, for any purpose (freedom 0). > The AGPL denies recipients this freedom. How does the AGPL deny recipients this freedom?
  - candiodari 9y ago
    Probably this is a misunderstanding of the parent post. It might be useful to explain: AGPL does not forbid running a piece of software as a network service, of course you can do that. You must, however, provide the users with the source code to the software, and their data (upon request, you can even ask money for this service). With the source, you must include the right to redistribute the source further. This is the same demand the GPL always demanded of users, however the advent of cloud software has enabled a sort of loophole in the sense that making software based on GPL software available for users through a web interface was not regulated and thus imposed no demands for source redistribution (same for other distribution "through the cloud", for instance, some companies do this using VNC, RDP or Citrix. There's also custom protocols). If outlook used the Exim mail service, for instance, you would be able to get the source for that service from Microsoft. It also closes the RPC loophole. If you build a GPL piece of software into another piece, connect them up using some sort of RPC interface, in GPLv2 it is somewhat unclear whether this constitutes redistribution (and therefore requires full source) or not. In AGPL/GPLv3, there is no doubt: it does require source to the whole thing.
    - angersock 9y ago
      Yeah, no thanks, I'll use BSD-licensed software.
      - candiodari 9y ago
        I think you'll find the "users" of the GPL are software authors, not people who use the software. Good luck replacing your linux kernel with something else. I mean FreeBSD is doable, but easy ... no.
        9y ago
- TheCoelacanth 9y ago
  And the GPL restricts freedoms 2 and 3. Both are explicitly designed to preserve freedom for everyone forever, not to maximum freedom for the next person in the chain. In the view of the FSF, the freedom to deny other people the same freedoms that you have is not a freedom worth preserving.

geofft 9y ago

The FSF has its own statement on what freedom means: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.en.html https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.en.html > The freedom to run the program as you wish, for any purpose (freedom 0). The AGPL denies recipients this freedom.

thomasahle 9y ago
>> The freedom to run the program as you wish, for any purpose (freedom 0). > The AGPL denies recipients this freedom. The disagreement here is of course about who the user is. If you are running the software on a server for others to use, you are not the user in the eyes of FSF. Luckily multiple licenses exist, so when you write a piece of software you get to decide what definition of user you want to grant freedoms to.
cornholio 9y ago
Applied to cloud computing, they would argue that the person running the software is actually the end-user and not the owners of the cloud.
gregknicholson 9y ago
>> The freedom to run the program as you wish, for any purpose (freedom 0). > The AGPL denies recipients this freedom. How does the AGPL deny recipients this freedom?
- candiodari 9y ago
  Probably this is a misunderstanding of the parent post. It might be useful to explain: AGPL does not forbid running a piece of software as a network service, of course you can do that. You must, however, provide the users with the source code to the software, and their data (upon request, you can even ask money for this service). With the source, you must include the right to redistribute the source further. This is the same demand the GPL always demanded of users, however the advent of cloud software has enabled a sort of loophole in the sense that making software based on GPL software available for users through a web interface was not regulated and thus imposed no demands for source redistribution (same for other distribution "through the cloud", for instance, some companies do this using VNC, RDP or Citrix. There's also custom protocols). If outlook used the Exim mail service, for instance, you would be able to get the source for that service from Microsoft. It also closes the RPC loophole. If you build a GPL piece of software into another piece, connect them up using some sort of RPC interface, in GPLv2 it is somewhat unclear whether this constitutes redistribution (and therefore requires full source) or not. In AGPL/GPLv3, there is no doubt: it does require source to the whole thing.
  - angersock 9y ago
    Yeah, no thanks, I'll use BSD-licensed software.
    - candiodari 9y ago
      I think you'll find the "users" of the GPL are software authors, not people who use the software. Good luck replacing your linux kernel with something else. I mean FreeBSD is doable, but easy ... no.
      - 9y ago
TheCoelacanth 9y ago
And the GPL restricts freedoms 2 and 3. Both are explicitly designed to preserve freedom for everyone forever, not to maximum freedom for the next person in the chain. In the view of the FSF, the freedom to deny other people the same freedoms that you have is not a freedom worth preserving.