Get ready....

[Derek J. Balling]

>Yes.  I would very much like for someone with legal experience who is
>familiar with the GPL to step in so we can come to a conclusion on the
>legality of copying/modifying the GNU GPL.  We have conflicting posts, and I
>can't proceed until this is cleared up.

Agreed. I'd ask my fiancee, but she's not quite far enough along in her law
school. 
;-)

>I will have to think on this.  I am an extremely strong proponent of the GNU
>GPL, and would like to see all open source licenses created to be GPL
>compatible.  On the other hand, I believe a developer should have the
>freedom to create a license to fit his needs(with his user's freedoms in
mind).

That's a noble goal, but completely unrealistic. Not all business models
will be GPL compatible. Restricting ourselves to that mindset will not be
beneficial.

>> Your argument would support that. Can you define what makes the cases
>> different? Philosophically they are identical as far as I can tell.
>No, they are not identical.  Random search and seizures violate the freedoms
>of the public at large, not just one individual.  Preserving the freedoms of
>the public at large by sacrificing the freedom of one individual does not.

No they don't. They violate ONE person - the person you are searching. 

Now admittedly THIS portion of the thread is getting off-topic, and I'll be
happy to end this portion of the discussion if that's what you were
referring to.

>> I think a discussion like this should be out in the open. If the list-owner
>> wants to deem it off-topic, I'm sure that they'll say something (unless
>> you're the list-owner *grin*)
>Can the list-owner comment?  There is nothing I hate more that off-topic 
>threads.

Agreed.

D