An explanation of the difficulty of solving licenseproliferation in one sentence

[Rod Dixon, J.D., LL.M.]

I accept your distinction, although I have not always noticed the same 
distinction made by others. Still, I am unsure whether your distinction 
bears out; if you recognize the importance of preserving the freedom to 
contract, how does the proposed solution really impact 
license-proliferation? I suppose an answer to that question requires a 
clear articulation of the license-proliferation problem first. 

 I am hopeful that we keep your distinction in mind as these matters are 
debated. 
------------
Rod Dixon
www.cyberspaces.org

...... Original Message .......
On Fri, 01 Apr 2005 10:41:24 +0100 Alex Bligh <alex at alex.org.uk> wrote:
>
>
>--On 31 March 2005 22:57 -0500 "Rod Dixon, J.D., LL.M." 
><roddixon at cyberspaces.org> wrote:
>
>> It is worth noting that the freedom to contract or to copyright your
>> software (by way of drafting a software license) is not a freedom that
>> can be easily abridged by this grouper any other.
>
>Hold your horses a second. I am a little sceptical about some of
>the "ills of license proliferation" remedies too, but noone is
>suggesting abridging the freedom of the licensor to choose the
>license of their choice. The most that is being suggested is that
>the OSI ceases to endorse such licenses, and what many people are
>suggesting is that it merely moves such licenses into a "secondary"
>category (i.e. 'yes, we confirm this is open source (i.e. meets the
>OSD), but no we do not recommend using it'). Whilst you may or may
>not support that proposition, I think characterising it as an abridgement
>of the freedoms of the licensor is incorrect.
>
>Alex
>