compatibility and the OSD

[Russell Nelson]

Rick Moen writes:
 > My impression is that the Board cannot be, for reasons externally
 > imposed upon it, arbitrary in criteria used for its certification
 > mark and program (which operates as per regulations over trademark law).

Yes, but it's not even as mechanistic as you say.  For example, we
don't approve licenses which limit use.  You can make any changes you
want to a program, so long as you don't publish them.  The OSD says
nothing about use of a program; as befits its origin, it only talks
about distribution of a program.  It doesn't even require that you
include the source of an open source binary.  On the other hand, it's
hardly arbitrary to deny use of the certification mark to somebody who
isn't distributing the source of their open source binary.

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