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> This is true in a technical sense. Restrictions on commercial use are incompatible with a very specific interpretation of what "free" means. I agree with thi

> This is true in a technical sense. Restrictions on commercial use are incompatible with a very specific interpretation of what "free" means. I agree with this. I'll go further: any software license, other than "do whatever you like with this work", imposes some restrictions on what you can do with it, and therefore is, in some sense restricting freedom. However, the sense that it is restricting freedom is not a particularly useful one.

josephcsible 5y ago
Not every restriction restricts freedom. For example, a license being copyleft only restricts power: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/freedom-or-power.en.html https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/freedom-or-power.en.html
- jobigoud 5y ago
  That's exactly the kind of semantics shenanigans the grandparent is talking about. The article you linked to uses a very specific definition of freedom that may or may not be shared by others intuitively, and uses that specific definition to argue that restricting certain uses are not actually restricting freedom but restricting another concept that they excluded from their definition of freedom in the first place.
  - thesuperbigfrog 5y ago
    The GNU GPL and similar copy-left licenses are freedom-preserving. They ensure that software licensed under the GPL (or similar license) grants users the four fundamental freedoms (https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html.en https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html.en) and that those freedoms cannot be taken away by copies, forks, or derivative works. If you want your software completely unrestricted, then the GPL is not what you want, but don't be surprised if someone creates a proprietary work using the completely unrestricted software. The choice is yours.
    - Blikkentrekker 5y ago
      > They ensure that software licensed under the GPL (or similar license) grants users the four fundamental freedoms (https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html.en https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html.en) and that those freedoms cannot be taken away by copies, forks, or derivative works. Yes, the F.S.F. has decided that those four freedoms are the only fundamental ones to care about and calls it some absolute semantic of freedom. Anyone can decree that one of those is not important, or add a fifth. And even within the F.S.F.'s framework there are problems. The G.C.C. had to be given a licence exception for the runtime it links against, otherwise arguably anything compiled with it would become a derivative product of it, and thus subject to the G.P.L.. The argument is that that prohibits the freedom to run the software for any purpose; the F.S.F. has always said that writing a clause in a licence to stop software from being used to make proprietary software would make it nonfree. So even there, the G.P.L. without such exceptions would create nonfree software if applied to compilers with a runtime.
      - thesuperbigfrog 5y ago
        >> Yes, the F.S.F. has decided that those four freedoms are the only fundamental ones to care about and calls it some absolute semantic of freedom. >> Anyone can decree that one of those is not important, or add a fifth. Freedom 0: The freedom to run the program as you wish, for any purpose Freedom 1: The freedom to study how the program works, and change it so it does your computing as you wish. (Access to the source code is a precondition for this.) Freedom 2: The freedom to redistribute copies so you can help others. Freedom 3: The freedom to distribute copies of your modified versions to others. (Access to the source code is a precondition for this.) Which freedoms do you disagree with and why? What freedoms are missing that you would like to see added? >> The G.C.C. had to be given a licence exception for the runtime it links against, otherwise arguably anything compiled with it would become a derivative product of it, and thus subject to the G.P.L. You are conflating GCC as free software with software created using GCC as a compiler. The runtime exception has been in place for quite a while and is part of the reason why GCC is very widely used. I would argue that the four freedoms are also part of the reason why GCC has been so successful.
  - jppittma 5y ago
    I don't think the point is entirely semantic. Saying that freedom means doing whatever you want is a very juvenile understanding of the concept. If you generalized that to laws that aren't just about software, but say, about violence, you'd wind up at the conclusion that laws that prevent theft and violence restrict freedom, when in the bigger picture it couldn't be further from the truth. Restricting other people's freedom to violence means I'm free to walk the streets without fear of harm, likewise, restricting your freedom to close source and sell my software means your end user is free to know what's running on his/her computer.
    - ketzu 5y ago
      Or it might lead to the conclusion that there are conflicting freedoms and reducing freedom may be unavoidable due to their conflicting nature instead of being inherently wrong. Making these kinds of decisions a balancing act based on which freedoms we value more or seem more apropriate. That would reduce the usefulness of the word "freedom" as absolute good though.
- i_am_proteus 5y ago
  But even with this definition: >Copyright law today grants software developers that power, so they and only they choose the rules to impose on everyone else—a relatively small number of people make the basic software decisions for all users, typically by denying their freedom. When users lack the freedoms that define free software, they can't tell what the software is doing, can't check for back doors, can't monitor possible viruses and worms, can't find out what personal information is being reported (or stop the reports, even if they do find out). If it breaks, they can't fix it; they have to wait for the developer to exercise its power to do so. If it simply isn't quite what they need, they are stuck with it. They can't help each other improve it. A non-commercial license still covers all of these "freedoms." The only caveat is that you can't sell it or derivatives thereof.
  - josephcsible 5y ago
    That list wasn't meant to be exhaustive.
    - i_am_proteus 5y ago
      It's not about exhaustion or enumeration, it's about justification. Almost all of the justification (quoth GNU) for using a completely permissive copyleft license also applies to a NC license.
      - josephcsible 5y ago
        > a completely permissive copyleft license What do you mean by that? Aren't "permissive" and "copyleft" opposites?
- tyingq 5y ago
  GPL is interesting in that it has wildly varying degrees of influence depending on what kind of software is licensed. Lots of companies, for example, extract value out of Linux without thinking much about the GPL. Because the "linking" bit never comes into play. On a smaller scale, GnuPG is similar, because the default interface is pipes and not a linked api.

josephcsible 5y ago

Not every restriction restricts freedom. For example, a license being copyleft only restricts power: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/freedom-or-power.en.html https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/freedom-or-power.en.html

jobigoud 5y ago
That's exactly the kind of semantics shenanigans the grandparent is talking about. The article you linked to uses a very specific definition of freedom that may or may not be shared by others intuitively, and uses that specific definition to argue that restricting certain uses are not actually restricting freedom but restricting another concept that they excluded from their definition of freedom in the first place.
- thesuperbigfrog 5y ago
  The GNU GPL and similar copy-left licenses are freedom-preserving. They ensure that software licensed under the GPL (or similar license) grants users the four fundamental freedoms (https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html.en https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html.en) and that those freedoms cannot be taken away by copies, forks, or derivative works. If you want your software completely unrestricted, then the GPL is not what you want, but don't be surprised if someone creates a proprietary work using the completely unrestricted software. The choice is yours.
  - Blikkentrekker 5y ago
    > They ensure that software licensed under the GPL (or similar license) grants users the four fundamental freedoms (https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html.en https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html.en) and that those freedoms cannot be taken away by copies, forks, or derivative works. Yes, the F.S.F. has decided that those four freedoms are the only fundamental ones to care about and calls it some absolute semantic of freedom. Anyone can decree that one of those is not important, or add a fifth. And even within the F.S.F.'s framework there are problems. The G.C.C. had to be given a licence exception for the runtime it links against, otherwise arguably anything compiled with it would become a derivative product of it, and thus subject to the G.P.L.. The argument is that that prohibits the freedom to run the software for any purpose; the F.S.F. has always said that writing a clause in a licence to stop software from being used to make proprietary software would make it nonfree. So even there, the G.P.L. without such exceptions would create nonfree software if applied to compilers with a runtime.
    - thesuperbigfrog 5y ago
      >> Yes, the F.S.F. has decided that those four freedoms are the only fundamental ones to care about and calls it some absolute semantic of freedom. >> Anyone can decree that one of those is not important, or add a fifth. Freedom 0: The freedom to run the program as you wish, for any purpose Freedom 1: The freedom to study how the program works, and change it so it does your computing as you wish. (Access to the source code is a precondition for this.) Freedom 2: The freedom to redistribute copies so you can help others. Freedom 3: The freedom to distribute copies of your modified versions to others. (Access to the source code is a precondition for this.) Which freedoms do you disagree with and why? What freedoms are missing that you would like to see added? >> The G.C.C. had to be given a licence exception for the runtime it links against, otherwise arguably anything compiled with it would become a derivative product of it, and thus subject to the G.P.L. You are conflating GCC as free software with software created using GCC as a compiler. The runtime exception has been in place for quite a while and is part of the reason why GCC is very widely used. I would argue that the four freedoms are also part of the reason why GCC has been so successful.
- jppittma 5y ago
  I don't think the point is entirely semantic. Saying that freedom means doing whatever you want is a very juvenile understanding of the concept. If you generalized that to laws that aren't just about software, but say, about violence, you'd wind up at the conclusion that laws that prevent theft and violence restrict freedom, when in the bigger picture it couldn't be further from the truth. Restricting other people's freedom to violence means I'm free to walk the streets without fear of harm, likewise, restricting your freedom to close source and sell my software means your end user is free to know what's running on his/her computer.
  - ketzu 5y ago
    Or it might lead to the conclusion that there are conflicting freedoms and reducing freedom may be unavoidable due to their conflicting nature instead of being inherently wrong. Making these kinds of decisions a balancing act based on which freedoms we value more or seem more apropriate. That would reduce the usefulness of the word "freedom" as absolute good though.
i_am_proteus 5y ago
But even with this definition: >Copyright law today grants software developers that power, so they and only they choose the rules to impose on everyone else—a relatively small number of people make the basic software decisions for all users, typically by denying their freedom. When users lack the freedoms that define free software, they can't tell what the software is doing, can't check for back doors, can't monitor possible viruses and worms, can't find out what personal information is being reported (or stop the reports, even if they do find out). If it breaks, they can't fix it; they have to wait for the developer to exercise its power to do so. If it simply isn't quite what they need, they are stuck with it. They can't help each other improve it. A non-commercial license still covers all of these "freedoms." The only caveat is that you can't sell it or derivatives thereof.
- josephcsible 5y ago
  That list wasn't meant to be exhaustive.
  - i_am_proteus 5y ago
    It's not about exhaustion or enumeration, it's about justification. Almost all of the justification (quoth GNU) for using a completely permissive copyleft license also applies to a NC license.
    - josephcsible 5y ago
      > a completely permissive copyleft license What do you mean by that? Aren't "permissive" and "copyleft" opposites?
tyingq 5y ago
GPL is interesting in that it has wildly varying degrees of influence depending on what kind of software is licensed. Lots of companies, for example, extract value out of Linux without thinking much about the GPL. Because the "linking" bit never comes into play. On a smaller scale, GnuPG is similar, because the default interface is pipes and not a linked api.