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You don't need the GPL for that; just provide the source code for your software. If users actually care about having the code, they can use your binary for whic

by pbsdp 13y ago

You don't need the GPL for that; just provide the source code for your software. If users actually care about having the code, they can use your binary for which code exists. If they don't care, they can use proprietary software, or proprietary extensions that make your software better. Either way, the user has full control over their choice of software, and nobody's actions can make your original open source code disappear. The GPL is really about enforcing your ideals onto other people's code if it happens to be reliant on yours. That's a legit quid pro quo for a license, but it has jackall to do with freedom or user rights.

gillianseed 13y ago
>The GPL is really about enforcing your ideals onto other people's code if it happens to be reliant on yours. Oh please, enough with the bs, your code won't just 'happen' to be relient on GPL licenced code. It's just as much of a choice as that of end users choosing not to use proprietary code which you keep repeating. And of course it has to do with user rights, that is what GPL preserves. The right to the source code of a binary containing GPL licenced code, the right to modify and build binaries from that said source code. It legally binds anyone who uses GPL licenced code to grant those _rights_ to their end users. Being able to examine the code for the ACTUAL binary you recieve, rather than some original source code which may very well have gone through numerous changes before being compiled into the ACTUAL binary you recieve are very different things. And I've already described how from a developer standpoint this is of importance as they are likely interested in recieving enhancements to their code in 'source code form' if they choose to licence under GPL, but it's also of importance in other aspects aswell since you as an end user may want to examine the source code to make sure it doesn't do something you don't want, or change it's behaviour to do something _you_ do want. Those are definitely 'user' rights.
- pbsdp 13y ago
  Your entire argument depends on the fiction that users can't make their own choices, or that somehow your code can be made non-OSS once released. Neither is true, and this hokey 'user rights' notion is just a thinly veiled justification for a paternalistic communist view of open source collaboration, in which you want to control not only your own code, but the code that other people write, too. It wouldn't be so insidious if it was presented honestly, as a set of limitations on freedom for your own benefit as the author of the GPL software, rather than in terms of the moral high ground of granting freedoms.
  - spacelizard 13y ago
    >Neither is true, and this hokey 'user rights' notion is just a thinly veiled justification for a paternalistic communist view of open source collaboration, in which you want to control not only your own code, but the code that other people write, too. No, this makes no sense. The only people who want to "control code" are proprietary companies. Copyleft and the GPL is a rejection of this, the main goal of it is to ensure that all users have equal control over the software. I don't know know how you draw the conclusion that the GPL only benefits the author, as the author loses most if not all of the (unjust) powers granted by copyright by publishing under the GPL.
    - pbsdp 13y ago
      > The only people who want to "control code" are proprietary companies. Copyleft and the GPL is a rejection of this ... So copyleft/GPL licensing isn't an attempt to 'control' code? Despite the fact that this is exactly what they do? > ... the main goal of it is to ensure that all users have equal control over the software. The users already have the choice to use open-source software vs. proprietary software. If they want to have "equal control" over the software, all they have to do is make the choice to only use open-source software. > I don't know know how you draw the conclusion that the GPL only benefits the author, as the author loses most if not all of the (unjust) powers granted by copyright by publishing under the GPL. The author enters into a quid-pro-quo arrangement by which they get access to other people's code under terms equal to their own, and they're free to relicense their own code for whatever commercial use they want. It's an attempt to create a communistic shared ownership of code.
      - spacelizard 13y ago
        Copyright is what allows people to "control code." Copyleft is necessary to in essence "reverse the effects" of copyright. So yes it does technically leverage the control copyright provides, but this is necessary as everything is copyrighted by default. The author being able to re-license code he owns the copyrights to is an unfortunate side effect of copyright, but there is little that copyleft can do about that, it could happen regardless of the license chosen. A possible solution would be to transfer copyright to a group or person you know will never license anything under a proprietary license, such as the FSF. Please refrain from using non-sequiturs like "communistic" to describe things. Copyleft does not deny anyone the ability to exercise any freedom including selling the software. The idea of copyright, and the idea that software should have "owners" are non-capitalistic ideas to begin with, so if anything the proprietary software companies are practicing authoritarianism.

by pbsdp 13y ago

gillianseed 13y ago

>The GPL is really about enforcing your ideals onto other people's code if it happens to be reliant on yours. Oh please, enough with the bs, your code won't just 'happen' to be relient on GPL licenced code. It's just as much of a choice as that of end users choosing not to use proprietary code which you keep repeating. And of course it has to do with user rights, that is what GPL preserves. The right to the source code of a binary containing GPL licenced code, the right to modify and build binaries from that said source code. It legally binds anyone who uses GPL licenced code to grant those _rights_ to their end users. Being able to examine the code for the ACTUAL binary you recieve, rather than some original source code which may very well have gone through numerous changes before being compiled into the ACTUAL binary you recieve are very different things. And I've already described how from a developer standpoint this is of importance as they are likely interested in recieving enhancements to their code in 'source code form' if they choose to licence under GPL, but it's also of importance in other aspects aswell since you as an end user may want to examine the source code to make sure it doesn't do something you don't want, or change it's behaviour to do something _you_ do want. Those are definitely 'user' rights.

pbsdp 13y ago
Your entire argument depends on the fiction that users can't make their own choices, or that somehow your code can be made non-OSS once released. Neither is true, and this hokey 'user rights' notion is just a thinly veiled justification for a paternalistic communist view of open source collaboration, in which you want to control not only your own code, but the code that other people write, too. It wouldn't be so insidious if it was presented honestly, as a set of limitations on freedom for your own benefit as the author of the GPL software, rather than in terms of the moral high ground of granting freedoms.
- spacelizard 13y ago
  >Neither is true, and this hokey 'user rights' notion is just a thinly veiled justification for a paternalistic communist view of open source collaboration, in which you want to control not only your own code, but the code that other people write, too. No, this makes no sense. The only people who want to "control code" are proprietary companies. Copyleft and the GPL is a rejection of this, the main goal of it is to ensure that all users have equal control over the software. I don't know know how you draw the conclusion that the GPL only benefits the author, as the author loses most if not all of the (unjust) powers granted by copyright by publishing under the GPL.
  - pbsdp 13y ago
    > The only people who want to "control code" are proprietary companies. Copyleft and the GPL is a rejection of this ... So copyleft/GPL licensing isn't an attempt to 'control' code? Despite the fact that this is exactly what they do? > ... the main goal of it is to ensure that all users have equal control over the software. The users already have the choice to use open-source software vs. proprietary software. If they want to have "equal control" over the software, all they have to do is make the choice to only use open-source software. > I don't know know how you draw the conclusion that the GPL only benefits the author, as the author loses most if not all of the (unjust) powers granted by copyright by publishing under the GPL. The author enters into a quid-pro-quo arrangement by which they get access to other people's code under terms equal to their own, and they're free to relicense their own code for whatever commercial use they want. It's an attempt to create a communistic shared ownership of code.
    - spacelizard 13y ago
      Copyright is what allows people to "control code." Copyleft is necessary to in essence "reverse the effects" of copyright. So yes it does technically leverage the control copyright provides, but this is necessary as everything is copyrighted by default. The author being able to re-license code he owns the copyrights to is an unfortunate side effect of copyright, but there is little that copyleft can do about that, it could happen regardless of the license chosen. A possible solution would be to transfer copyright to a group or person you know will never license anything under a proprietary license, such as the FSF. Please refrain from using non-sequiturs like "communistic" to describe things. Copyleft does not deny anyone the ability to exercise any freedom including selling the software. The idea of copyright, and the idea that software should have "owners" are non-capitalistic ideas to begin with, so if anything the proprietary software companies are practicing authoritarianism.