Comment by EarlKing | Hacker News Reader

Comment by EarlKing | Hacker News Reader

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> For another, RMS created the free software movement, in an era where most software was proprietary.

Stallman did a lot of things, but he most definitely did not start the free software movement. Free software was the norm prior to the meeting of the Committee on New Technology Uses (CONTU) suggesting in 1977 that rather than try to amend the recently passed Copyright Act of 1976 they should just classify software as 'literature'. It continued to be the norm and was openly termed "Freeware" by author Jay Lucas at InfoWorld (until a certain lawyer, Andrew Fluegelman, trademarked the term and began threatening legal action if he didn't change the name of his "Freeware" column, leading to a contest which suggested the term "Shareware"). Most freeware of the time came with source code and the right to make modifications (in fact this is how a number of improvements were made to Fluegelman's own PC-TALK). It wasn't until after the coining of Shareware that the two terms were hijacked by people essentially using it to create freely recirculatable demos of otherwise proprietary products, much like 'free software' was later repackaged as 'open source'.

I'm not saying you shouldn't be thankful for his contributions, but to pretend that BSD didn't exist, nor an entire tradition of free software prior to the rise of proprietary software, is simply wrong.

Free Software is software where you're obligated to share your source code changes if you distribute them. It's not anything that was ever referred to once as "free software" outside of this definition, and it is not any software that is free.

edit: hearing irrelevant histories like this makes me more upset that Stallman is the only person who keeps Free Software firmly in mind, and doesn't waver. Free software isn't a vibe, Open Source software can easily become Free Software if you relicense it within a GPL'd project (just as it can be incorporated into proprietary projects), but Open Source software is not Free Software. Free Software is what Stallman said it was, and has only been extended in a few logical ways that Stallman failed to anticipate ahead of time.

Histories of people sharing source, and of not being able to copyright software are nice, but irrelevant.

All copyleft software is Free software (as defined by the FSF), but not all Free software is copyleft. So it's incorrect to say that all Free software licenses obligate you to share your changes to the source code. Permissive licenses like MIT and BSD are also Free software licenses according to the FSF.

See this explainer by the FSF: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/categories.html

Free software doesn't need to be copyleft, which is what you're describing - eg, the FSF explicitly considers 3 clause BSD to be a free license. Similarly Open Source (as used by the OSI) doesn't require that you can incorporate into proprietary projects and it considers the GPL to be open source. Somewhat famously the definitions of the two terms are basically equivalent even though they're motivated quite differently.

> Free Software is software where you're obligated

I think that sums up the root of the entire debate. :)

> Free Software is software where you're obligated to share your source code changes if you distribute them.

> obligated

....so, basically, Free as in Slavery?

Seriously, I'm not going to stand by and watch GNU partisans try to rewrite history.

It is called "Free Software" because the software is free (liberated, unconstrained), not you. You are "obligated" to keep the software free.

If it were truly "free" then it wouldn't need to "obligate" you to do anything.

I think it is time to refuse to call GPL 'free software'. It is not free like freedom. It can be free as free beer, but since you must pay for it with your changes, and can't/hard to monetize them, free as beer is questionable as best.

I don't think you "must pay for it with your changes," as in article 5, Conveying Modified Source Versions, it only says that the work must do the following:

- have a notice that you modified it,

- have a notice that the work is licensed under the GPL,

- be licensed under the GPL, and

- if the work has interactive UIs, it must display Appropriate Legal Notices.

It says nothing about contributing changes back, the only freedom it restricts is the "freedom" to restrict the freedom of others. It is like the whole "is prohibiting slavery reducing freedom" problem.

> in article 5, Conveying Modified Source Versions, it only says that the work must do the following:

You have to keep reading the entire license...

Section 6 of v3 begins:

You may convey a covered work in object code form under the terms of sections 4 and 5, provided that you also convey the machine-readable Corresponding Source under the terms of this License, in one of these ways:

a) Convey the object code in, or embodied in, a physical product (including a physical distribution medium), accompanied by the Corresponding Source fixed on a durable physical medium customarily used for software interchange.

<or several other functionally similar ways are options in the full text linked below>

How is that not needing to convey your source changes to those whom you distribute the object code?

It’s been there since v1:

Paragraph 3 of the v1 or v2 GPL is similar to section 6 of v3:

You may copy and distribute the Program (or a portion or derivative of it, under Paragraph 2) in object code or executable form under the terms of Paragraphs 1 and 2 above provided that you also do one of the following:

a) accompany it with the complete corresponding machine-readable source code, which must be distributed under the terms of Paragraphs 1 and 2 above; or,

<do other things that have the same effect>

https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-3.0.en.html

https://www.gnu.org/licenses/old-licenses/gpl-1.0.html

I think we have a different view on the meaning of "pay with your changes." I take it to mean "you must send patches/pull requests/... to the upstream project," which isn't the case. Whereas, if my reading of your message is right (feel free to correct me if I'm wrong) you consider it to mean something like "you must make the changes you make public."

I personally wouldn't consider the second interpretation as "paying" for Free Software any more as I would consider having people publically criticise me as "paying" for Free Expression.

You only have to send your changes to anyone to whom you distribute the modified program.

If that’s upstream, then you have to offer them upstream. If that’s to someone else who then decides to share them upstream, that’s also something you can’t prevent.

If you don’t distribute the program, you don’t have to send your changes anywhere.

(My main point was your citation of only Section 5 was incomplete with regards to your obligations under GPL.)

> It is like the whole "is prohibiting slavery reducing freedom" problem.

Except there are dozens of incompatible (A/L)GPL (2,3) licenses alone and an uncountable number of minor modifications of the same. So you end up with the "freedom" not to share code between various GPLed projects because they all are slightly different flavors of free.

Most of those licenses are at least one way compatible with each other

Why is free as beer questionable? Do you expect to monetize the free beer that someone gives you?

Yes ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Also the free but not really has already a name, called shareware. I think it's just their marketing ability that they managed to be called free software, despite the definition of the word. (But GPL is not really about the price of the software, they aim to be free as freedom, but .. they are not.)

It's called "free software", not "free developer". Free beer also doesn't mean you get to own the glass it came in.

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