Communication skills

[Rick Moen]

Quoting Ben Tilly (btilly at gmail.com):

> Speaking as a disinterested party, *I* object to following Russ'
> proposal right now.  The license was put forth.  The submitter has a
> strong opinion on the name.  Nobody has actually asked that it be
> presented with the name FreeBSD License.
 
Objection, counselor!  OSI's primary concern is the benefit of open 
source.  It is not a free-of-charge certification bureau dedicated to
making applicants happy.  (I was not intending to express a view on
Russ's suggestion, or Chris Travers's restatement of same, but on 
first glance either looks constructive and reasonable.)

> If we really care about what the FreeBSD folks think....

Again, this framing of the issue is a red herring.  I infer that Russ is
not seeking to make FreeBSD committers happy, but rather promoting
clarity in what the Board chooses to vote on and publish.

> (Frankly for me the fact that OpenBSD used the same license before
> FreeBSD is enough to convince me that it shouldn't be called the
> FreeBSD License.)

Frankly, to me, it suggests the usefulness of a footnote listing some
appropriate number of "AKAs" to whatever name gets used -- limiting the
field to names actually used in public.

> Honestly, who in the community seriously doubts that any BSD variant
> is truly open source, no matter what the OSI says?

I don't think you've gazed very far down that slippery slope, nor seen
what dreck "BSD-style" licences with various borderline-insane
proprietary restrictions exist in the field.