Greg Lee <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> posted [EMAIL PROTECTED], excerpted below, on Fri, 10 Oct 2008 16:29:22 +0000:
> So, let me see if I understand your principle. True freedom includes > the right not to be criticized for discourtesy or for failure to give > credit where credit is due. Do I have that right? Even if there is an > ethical requirement, this must not be /claimed/, for fear of infringing > the freedom of those not meeting the requirement by calling attention to > their failure. But there's not an ethical requirement. That's what I've been saying. There's an accepted requirement to acknowledge where individual software packages come from and that's done. There's no requirement, legal or ethical, that a particular name is used, either collectively or for individual packages. IOW, so it's called Linux and that happens to be the name of a supposedly more minor component than all of what GNU contributed. Big deal. It could be called "xunil" or "ung" or "linux" or "gnu" or "cows jump over the moon" for all it matters. Neither GNU nor SugarCRM can ethically force a particular name or sub-name, or it's no longer free software. Requiring that the sources be made available to the user so they can make modifications as they find useful is one thing. Requiring, either ethically or legally, that they use a particular name, is quite something else, and that makes it unfree, whether that requirement is legal or just claimed ethical. The claim to a particular name or subname simply isn't legit, nor can it be made so and maintain the freedom of the software at issue. Requiring you /not/ (negative name requirement due to reservation) to use a particular /reserved/ name if there are changes (basically trademark enforcement) is allowed, but requiring that a particular name or name component be included (positive name requirement), simply doesn't work. -- Duncan - List replies preferred. No HTML msgs. "Every nonfree program has a lord, a master -- and if you use the program, he is your master." Richard Stallman _______________________________________________ Pan-users mailing list Pan-users@nongnu.org http://lists.nongnu.org/mailman/listinfo/pan-users
