what *is* the approval process?

Chris Travers chris.travers at gmail.com
Tue Sep 4 00:21:50 UTC 2007


First of all, I want to state a few things about limitations on the approval
process.

We really can't ever come to an understanding of whether a license is
eligable for approval if we don't know what it means.  There are areas of
the GPL3 which still seem sketchy from a procedural perspective (and while I
can live with the idea that the permissions removal essentially creates an
ineffectual sublicense, as Matt has stated, I am still not sure if this is
truly the case).

We need to understand such a license before we can make such a decision.  If
we are to vett the licenses, let us do our job.

Finally, there are some on this list who are trolls (in the sense that they
simply want to present an inflamatory point of view in order to get a
response), and there are others on this list who do have different opinions
including concerns over standard copyleft theory (myself included).  There
is a difference and we should not forget that.

The GPL3 is a strongly polarizing force.  Already there are BSD variants
which specifically forbid sublicensing under the GPL, and I would expect
these to increase.  If OSI is to avoid simply becoming a political
organization in the same way the FSF is, we need to tread carefully.

Best Wishes,
Chris Travers
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