Jonathan, I understood your intent.
It's laudable. In fact, I was planning myself to write a license very like that which you describe. However, I question that it's necessary. IMO, it would be a good thing if all free software were GPLed. I believe in copyleft. Now, I respect other authors' right not to copyleft their software. They can do what they want with it. However, the GPL's incompatibility is its strength. People *do* relicense their software under the GPL when they realise that not doing so has caused compatibility issues. It's a more forward-looking approach, in a curious way. Suppose you, Jonathan, release a really cool library libbar, under your putative new license. FiendSoft, Inc. then publish a really cool modification to it - libbarplus, and release it under a really irritating, but DFSG-free, license. They can do this, because your copyleft gave them permission. Perhaps the Fiend Public License has a patch clause. And an advertising clause. Maybe a notification clause, even, if we decide they are free. Now, I can't take libbarplus and incorporate it into my GPL'ed mail-reader. Even if I was the sole author (and thus could add the necessary permissions to the GPL), I still wouldn't want to. Patch clauses suck. So do advertising clauses. I'd probably end up reimplementing libbarplus myself. And GPL'ing the result. Duplication of work - which is bad. But I'd get a GPL'ed library, which suits me well. This is all opinion. You may not care about the above scenario, or you may think it's inevitable. But I do believe that the pressure that the GPL exerts, because of its incompatibilities, to GPL everything, is a beneficial one. Jules /----------------+-------------------------------+---------------------\ | Jelibean aka | [EMAIL PROTECTED] | 6 Evelyn Rd | | Jules aka | | Richmond, Surrey | | Julian Bean | [EMAIL PROTECTED] | TW9 2TF *UK* | +----------------+-------------------------------+---------------------+ | War doesn't demonstrate who's right... just who's left. | | When privacy is outlawed... only the outlaws have privacy. | \----------------------------------------------------------------------/
