Matthew Garrett wrote: > Glenn Maynard <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: <snip> >>"Send it to a third party" and "reveal your identity" are just as readily >>read as non-free from DFSG#1 as "pet a cat" and "distribution only on CD". >>If the former can't be considered non-free from DFSG#1, then I don't think >>the latter can, either; DFSG#1 would be rendered meaningless. > > So why is "You must give the source to the recipient of the binaries" > not equally objectionable from this point of view?
That is simply a restriction on the allowed forms of distribution (namely, you may distribute source, or binaries plus source; you are not granted permission to distribute binaries alone). Similarly, (under various licenses), you may only distribute with ChangeLogs attached, only with copyright notices, only with a copy of the license attached, only in the form of an "original" plus "patches", etc. Distribution only on CD is also such a restriction, but an unacceptable one. All the acceptable restrictions I can think of are of this form. (Of course, not all restrictions of this form are acceptable.) "Send it to a third party" and "Pet a Cat" are restrictions which are not of this form. This is Dictator Test-type stuff. >>Yes, there's interpretation involved. The DFSG is, as we all know, a set >>of guidelines; it must be interpreted to have any meaning at all, and >>debian-legal is the list on which that interpretation is done. > > debian-legal is the list on which some people offer their > interpretations. It has no official standing or status. It is the list on which the interpretation is done, simply because it isn't being done anywhere else! :-P -- There are none so blind as those who will not see.
