FC4 or FC5

Ed Greshko Ed.Greshko at greshko.com
Sun Jun 18 02:19:42 UTC 2006


jdow wrote:

> Sorry - if I purchase a copy of your product and it is GPL licensed I
> can ask for the source, expect to receive it, and then start selling
> it myself with near zero development overhead. I can also purchase it
> once and give it to all my friends, source and all. I can basically
> wipe out your business if I've a mind to. It'd all be legal. It might
> be unethical as all hell. But it'd be legal.

For that to happen you'd have to be assuming that the vast majority of
people are unethical/immoral.  There is a ton of non-GPL, non-opensource
software on the market today that can purchased, downloaded and then
installed on multiple systems, given away, poached, etc.  Do people do
it?  Yes.  Are businesses closing daily based on it?  No.  Why?  People
aren't as bad as some would like us to believe.

Some people seemed to have expressed the opinion that GPL and similar
licensing has lead to copyright infringement, IP abuse, etc.  Maybe
forgetting all the nice Windows based SW capable of hacking DVD's and
other similar Windows based utilities.

I know I'll regret having typed the above....

But this entire thread is no longer "FC4 or FC5".  I can't even recall
what the original question was...or even if it was a question.

It is now a religious war with various camps.  And, just as in religion,
there are the orthodox, conservatives, etc. all belonging to the same
sect and those of entirely different sects.  And just as in religious
wars there are never any winners.

It has degraded into name calling, blanket statements, unsubstantiated
statements and is going nowhere other than round and round.

It is no longer, (was it ever?), relevant to "For users of Fedora Core
releases" mailing list.

I gather the solution to not suffering through this will be a filter on
emails as the thread is as hard to ignore as fender bender on the
highway.  Or, I could create an appropriate mailing list for those
willing to continue the "discussion".  Would that help?

-- 
I'm using my X-RAY VISION to obtain a rare glimpse of the INNER WORKINGS
of this POTATO!!




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