OVPL summary

[Ian Lance Taylor]

Alex Bligh <alex at alex.org.uk> writes:

> --On 14 September 2005 13:23 -0700 Ian Lance Taylor <ian at airs.com> wrote:
> 
> >     You should also have the freedom to make modifications and use
> >     them privately in your own work or play, without even mentioning
> >     that they exist.  If you do publish your changes, you should not
> >     be required to notify anyone in particular, or in any particular
> >     way.
> >
> > The OVPL arguably violates that freedom, although I don't see that it
> > violates the OSD.
> 
> It doesn't violate it for the same reason the GPL doesn't violate it
> (argument about external deployment aside). If you use them *privately*
> you don't distribute, so there are no additional obligations. If you
> *publish* your changes, you do not have to notify anyone, respond to the
> ID, or anything else. The only additional obligation in this respect is
> if you use the changes neither privately, nor publicly (i.e. selectively
> distribute them).

I don't understand.

The case of private selective distribution is precisely the
interesting one here.  The GPL permits it.  The OVPL arguably does
not.  The second sentence of the paragraph quoted above is intended to
permit private selective distribution--that is, it is possible for a
group of people/companies to share modifications amongst themselves
without providing them to anybody else.  To the extent that the OVPL
prohibits private selective distribution, it violates that freedom.

Perhaps the word "publish" above is misleading.  In this context, it
really just means what we on this mailing list normally call
"distribute."  The context is here:
    http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html

Ian