[fab] Fedora as Free Software?

[Rahul Sundaram]

On Fri, 2006-04-21 at 18:06 -0400, Michael Tiemann wrote:
> I'm in Porto Alegre attending the FISL (Brazilian Free Software)
> conference.  Free software gets a lot of play down here in Brazil.
> 
> There's an edited copy of the Ubuntu distribution on the FSF's tabletop,
> as well as an edited copy of the Kubuntu distribution.  The edits look
> like this:
> 
>                     NOT                       NOT
>     This software is   free software.  You are   encouraged to share it
>                      ^                         ^
> 
> The point the FSF is making is that Ubuntu includes non-free software,
> like nVidia drivers.  I believe that the last go-round on the Fedora
> lists about our strong, STRONG commitment to free software suggests that
> we can take a strong position, and enlist the free software community to
> take a stand for us and with us.
> 
> Today, we have the following packaging guidelines for Fedora:
> 
>         The goal of The Fedora Project is to work with the Linux
>         community to build a complete, general purpose operating system
>         exclusively from open source software. In accordance with that,
>         all packages included in Fedora must be covered under an open
>         source license. 
>         
>         We clarify an open source license in three ways: 
>         
>               * OSI-approved license. You can find the list of OSI
>                 approved licenses here:
>                 [WWW]http://www.opensource.org/licenses/ 
>                 
>               * GPL-Compatible, Free Software Licenses. You can find the
>                 list here: [WWW]http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/license-
>                 list.html#GPLCompatibleLicenses 
>                 
>               * GPL-Incompatible, Free Software Licenses. You can find
>                 the list here:
>                 [WWW]http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/license-
>                 list.html#GPLIncompatibleLicenses 
>                 
> 
>         If the license of a package isn't covered in one of those lists,
>         urge the upstream maintainer to seek OSI-approval for their
>         license here:
>         [WWW]http://www.opensource.org/docs/certification_mark.php#approval 
> 
>         Alternately, if code is dual licensed, and one of the licenses
>         meets the open source license criteria, that code can be
>         included in Fedora under the open source license. 
> 
>         Kernel-module packages must use one of the following licenses:
>         GNU General Public License v2.0, GNU Lesser General Public
>         License v2, IBM Public License v1.0, Common Public License v0.5,
>         Q Public License v1.0, Open Software License v1.1, or any open
>         source license granted by Red Hat. 
> 
>         Note that any kernel module licensed with any license except GPL
>         or LGPL will taint the kernel. 
> 
> I'm wondering what you guys think about changing the tilt of Fedora from
> open source to free software.  Namely, saying that the license should
> meet the free software definition (
>  http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html ) and then mentioning that
> OSI-certified licenses (with the exception of the Reciprocal Public
> License, which we're going to reevaluate) are a good list, as well as
> the free software licenses that are listed on the FSF website.
> 
> The goal is to make Fedora a distribution that the FSF can positively
> endorse.  I think we're really close.  Any reason to not try to go all
> the way?

I was corresponding with RMS earlier after a brief discussion in the
earlier advisors list and he brought in the point that the current
guidelines allow open source licenses which FSF consider's non-free. A
mail to licensing at gnu.org will get FSF to evaluate a license an a post
will be made to http://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html on FSF's
opinion. There have been apprehensions about getting into political
maneuvering which is valid concern to a good extend but this is
something worth exploring.


Rahul