Ethics (OT) (was Re: Antiwar License)

[Robin 'Roblimo' Miller]

>
>
>Of course, everyone should decide for themselves what use
>of their work is acceptable and what use is not.  One thing
>that people can not do is stay on the sidelines on the
>issue.  One way or the other, either you're allowing
>use of your work to kill or you're not.
>

And there is also the point that using your software to *prevent* 
killing is good, and sometimes wars are just, and so on.

Here is an interview I did that started out technical, veered into the 
political, and got so strong on the political side that -- with the 
interviewee's permission -- I only ran the political portion:

http://newsforge.com/article.pl?sid=03/02/25/195228&mode=nested&tid=4

I was at an Open Source convention in Amman, Jordan, in December, and 
there were debates over using KDE -- because some KDE developers live in 
Israel. Miguel di Icaza supports the Palestinian cause, so presumably 
Gnome is okay. But since I'm Jewish, maybe I shouldn't use Gnome? And 
then, what about all the Germans who work on KDE? And Mandrake... Why, 
just look at how those French obstruct American foreign policy!

Can't talk to Alan Cox because the Brits once burned the U.S. Capitol... 
Can't let Russians or Chinese use anything because of  how they treat 
their conquered peoples... Red Hat is evil because they removed the 
Taiwan flag from their distro to placate the Commie Chinese...  

This gets out of hand. I happen to think Khaled, a major Linux junkie 
(and devout Muslim) in Saudi Arabia, is a pretty neat guy. I use 
Mandrake and KDE. I like Miguel and Alan a lot. Most of the people I met 
in Jordan were decent. And I have plenty of friends in the U.S. 
military, and I was in the Army myself, years ago.

Reality = you can do what you want with your software. But limiting its 
use keeps it from being Open Source just as surely as Khaled's code 
wouldn't be Open Source if he didn't allow its use by Israelis.

- Robin






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