sew watt? Re: WG: MSFT and GNU questions

[Charley]

well I'm a relative newcomer to this aspect of the game but as a documenter,
the Artistic License is of great importance.  I just would like to append
(not argue) your point that Artistic License is the oldest of licenses and
probably predates the abacus!  Under what license were the ancient texts
written?  How far back can you trace the use of code?

Think in terms of requirements and specification.  Did Shakespeare apply for
a license when he wrote the specs. for the Globe Theatre?  Did he copyright
the notation he used for writing the Romeo and Juliet scripts?  The
archetypical framework inside which we move about is a process of discovery.
It does not originate with us.  We only borrow the rights while we're
breathing.

If we are Blessed, then those who are still breathing will Honor us when
we've left this realm.

In the Honor and Spirit of,
Anonymous


-----Original Message-----
From: Angelo Schneider [mailto:angelo.schneider at oomentor.de]
Sent: Sunday, June 10, 2001 5:21 PM
To: License-Discuss list
Subject: so waht? Re: WG: MSFT and GNU questions



David Johnson <david at usermode.org>
wrote:
[...]
> And, while GPL isn't the *only* free software license, some 90% of
> free
> software projects (based on independent counts by me of SourceForge
> aprojects and Debian packages) use the GPL and/or LGPL licenses.
> That's
> a very large majority.  A significant remainder are BSD/MIT or
> similar,
> many of these being fully GPL compatible.  MozPL and variants round
> out
> much of the remainder, on-off licenses and corporate licenses are
> relatively rare.  While a useage-weighted survey might suggest a
> greater
> significance of other licenses (BSD:  apache, bind; MIT:  X11; MozPL:
> Mozilla, Galeon, Skipstone...), there's no question that the GPL is
> significant both by the volume of usage and its own peculiar nature.
>
> That said...

So what?
The GPL and LGPL are arguable the oldest "free" or "open" licenses.
Slighly followed or even older, by MIT/BDS licenses.

Thats no wonder that there is more software published under that
license.

Reading this mailing list people are also strong encauraged not to
invent new ones but to choose existing ones.

If you look, it seems to my eye that GPL is the easyst, "I throw my code
to the public" license, where the author of the code has minimum hazzle
to consider side effects etc.

Other licenses are more complicated, so if I would like to get rid of
the burdon of some code, but also like it to be available for the public
I publsih it under GPL. That one needs the less infrastructure from my
side ....

Just my thoughts so ....

Regards,
       Angelo

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