Matthew Palmer <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > On Tue, Jul 13, 2004 at 03:57:49PM -0400, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > > The Dictator Test goes well beyond DFSG. DFSG clause 1 merely says > > that there is no fee or payment for the software. Nothing in DFSG says > > that the license must make no requirements at all. The Dictator > > Test is a stronger test. > > The dictator test, as I read it, does not say that a licence must make no > requirements at all. Every permission grant other than placing a work in > the Public Domain would fail if that were the case. >
"A licence is not Free if it prohibits actions which, in the absence of acceptance of the licence, would be allowed by copyright or other applicable laws." To be pedantic, I could have said: "Nothing in the DFSG says that a license must make no prohibition whatsoever". Do you disagree with that statement? If you agree with the statement, then how do you base the dictator test on DFSG? Aside from the lack of connection, I see a downright problem: the dictator test is relative to "applicable laws" which is a shifty concept at best. Applicable to whom? Under what circumstances? The dictator test gives you different answers depending on what copyright and "applicable" laws you decide that the test is talking about. That just can't be a good measure of DFSG-freeness, which lists specific things the license must not prohibit regardless of the jurisdiction. -Lex
