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GPL vs. BSD (Developers)

posted by Rugxulo Homepage, Usono, 22.06.2009, 10:11

> > > I don't think this has anything to do with NIH. It's simply that GPL
> is
> > a
> > > very restrictive license rooted in some ideology.
> >
> > Well, I haven't counted the universe yet (heh), but GPL seemingly
> > outnumbers BSD a billion times to one.
>
> Proving what? Dirt outnumbers diamonds too, but I rather have a few
> diamonds that a ton of dirt.
Really? Doing a lot of glass cutting? Because building a house needs more dirt than diamond. And one is way more expensive than the other. And expensive is no fun.

> > But having sources is always desirable, esp. when you have to fork
> > something due to no maintainer or broken main build.
>
> Or join it with some existing project and venture. And that is exactly why
> GPL is such a pain. Not only in the hard requirements, but also because of
> the multiple levels in a corporation you have to convince even in the rare
> case it is perfectly fine to use.
Corporations not cooperating is nothing new, and I don't blame FSF / GNU for that. Sure, lots of incompatible licenses hurts everybody, but that's not GPL's fault either. And sorry if I'm not more sympathetic to big business who is every bit as flaky in support as the average consumer is in wants. (Two sides of the same coin.)

> A lot of the GPL pain comes from the exclusiveness and the need for every
> party to agree (which essentially means BSD/PD or (L)GPL, excluding all
> hundreds of thousands of other licenses, even some as benign as MPL)
The real problem is that nobody attributes changes very well (e.g. XEmacs), so if that worries you, you should keep track from the beginning. I know that's not always feasible, but if you care, you have to make sure yourself. In all honestly, it's fairly obvious that at least 50% of the world doesn't even read licenses, EULAs, or care at all. Hence binary blobs, patents, incompatible licenses, trademark and copyright infringement, etc. etc. (And I am very lax about all this in thought too as it's way too pedantic and controlling IMHO. The legislators have gone way too far.)

> > > If you don't believe in that ideology to the fullest it is insane to
> > > make the requested sacrifice.
> >
> > It's not that insane. The only halfway insane part is using copyright
> law
> > to enforce it. Share and share alike. You like our code? You must share
> > yours too if you use it publicly.
>
> I must share it according to guidelines other people enforce on me. I
> don't set the requirements for my own sharing, but FSF does.
I heard today that GPL requires keeping sources available for three years. Now, I'm no lawyer, so I don't understand all that (third-party offers? um, no comprende). I do see where that could be difficult, but hey, it's not an offense against anyone, just a nicety for the end user. The GPL is all about the user. Isn't that what software should be?

> > > Sooner or later you want to use some code for some minor product, and
> > find
> > > yourself effectively excluded.
> >
> > Not really, you can commercially use it, you just can't do it based
> upon
> > closed sources.
>
> Which makes is equivalent to pretty much useless for programming in the
> commercial world. Contrary to e.g. for an OS kernel where it is
> survivable.

I'm not involved in any commercial software aspects, so I have little knowledge, experience, interest (or frankly, sympathy) for them. Rampant commercialism left unchecked is probably a bad thing.

> > I imagine they are trying to prevent companies from
> > dropping support on a whim or charging for simple bugfixes.
>
> More or less. But they did that in a very draconical and ideologically
> radical way, possibly to largely avoid any dispute. But that draconical
> way is the main problem.
You know how it is, build a better mouse trap, but the mouse always finds a way. E-mail? Great idea, but it got exploited by spam. Computers? Fouled up by viruses. Browsers? Phishing. It's always something. You can't win. As if we don't have enough laws and rules anyways. It's too much, I agree, but some people keep fighting. I'm sure you and I agree that when it hurts more than it helps that it's gone too far. So far GPL still has advantages.

> The same way with the much laxer LGPL. FSF forces people to adopt *their*
> views on updating componentized systems as *they* think they should look
> like. Which is e.g. why FPC is distributed under LGPL-with-linking
> exception to defang that dangerous clause
Too confusing for me, I don't understand most of that legal crap. I don't idealize any of it, but I do think "shared source" (with patent protection and free use) is a good thing. In short, there are a lot of crappy licenses out there, and the GPL is far from the worst.

> > P.S. I have nothing against anyone using either license. (I think
> licenses
> > are overrated anyways, attempt too much control over people, esp.
> EULAs.)
> > However, I do wish it wasn't such a hostile "us vs. them" mentality.
>
> By choosing LGPL/GPL, you are no different from them, and you essentially
> polarize the situation, and force your views on software restrictions upon
> others.
Well, as mentioned, I care little about licenses as long as they are "share and share alike" (or even freeware, better than nothing if less than ideal if abandoned). So I don't mind contributing my weak self to GPL or BSD or whatever projects. My aim is to help the software experience improve overall, and I won't refuse just because I don't like the minor legal aspects.

Anyways, as mentioned, the *BSD camps use GCC (<= 4.2.1, i.e. older GPLv2), so it's obviously not that bad. I wish I know a concrete example of where/when/why GPLv3 was bad for *BSD, that part makes no sense to me. (Also the whole optional "v2" instead of "v2 or later" variant seems a bit senseless to my eyes, which is what the Linux kernel uses.)

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