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Comment by naner | Hacker News Reader

I'm not really an advocate for the GPL, but I think when people express this sentiment they are going out of their way to misunderstand things.

The 'limits' imposed by the GPL just limit people from reducing the freedoms provided to the code that is covered... So it limits your ability to use GPL code to reduce the freedoms of others.

In GPL-speak freedom means code transparency while you're defining freedom to mean something else (the ability to do whatever you want with code... including reducing GPL'd code transparency).

It sounds convoluted to try and explain this but to me it seems pretty simple and self-explanatory.

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I honestly don't think it's simple. How can I possibly use GPL code to reduce anyone's freedom? By creating some derivative work? By doing so, I have not diminished your access to anything that already exists!

The way I understand it, the GPL guards against the possibility that some non-free derivative work will prove more popular, and so crowd out the free original - "to turn free software proprietary" as the FSF states it. This crowding-out may be a legitimate concern, but it's a subtle one: it's protecting code by preventing a certain class of competition, an act which may not be in the interest of users, who would probably welcome more choices.

I can draw an analogy to "poison pill" provisions: they protect the company from takeovers, but often work against the interest of shareholders.

"I honestly don't think it's simple. How can I possibly use GPL code to reduce anyone's freedom? By creating some derivative work? By doing so, I have not diminished your access to anything that already exists!"

Suppose you were a farmer that left town for a week or two. In that time I came in, fed your chickens and then took all the resulting eggs.

How can the above be theft? I haven't diminished your access to anything you already owned!

Great analogy.

I have to avoid GPL and LGPL code like the plague because I have to release close-sourced commercial software for my employer, and look for BSD licensed code for my own software because I have to eat.

In the GNU narrative, you are the bad guy.

You are depriving your users of freedom by releasing closed-source software.

I have heard Stallman literally say that stealing food is bad, but working on proprietary software is worse.

It's an interesting statement to make! I think both GPL and non-GPL have their merits and good/bad points, but I have worked hard on something and don't want to give it away. Stallman would likely steal the bread that I had taken to put on my table then.

It's not theft because you can copy the "chickens" in this case.

I think the example appears to be in support of GPL. The farmer here compares to whoever releases GPL code and who feeds the chickens are the users of the GPL code. Am I wrong?

> By doing so, I have not diminished your access to anything that already exists!

If you release it as proprietary, you have a license that says "You may not copy this program. Unauthorized copying will result in law suits". If someone get a copy of that program, how are they not restricted in their freedom to read, run, modify and share the program running on their computers?

As a developer, I do not wish to be a contributor software under such licenses. I will not support you with money or code. The only deal that I would accept is if we abolish copyright altogether, as then the restrictive license you want to use is void and null.

> when people express this sentiment they are going out of their way to misunderstand things.

A very wise alien once said:

"Now, this does not mean giving up any freedom except the freedom to act irresponsibly."

It was a great movie, BTW.

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