Glenn Maynard <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > On Sun, Sep 19, 2004 at 02:59:20PM +0100, Andrew Suffield wrote: >> Lawsuits are not intrinsically bad for free software. > > Software patent lawsuits attempting to prevent the use and distribution > of free software certainly is intrinsically bad for free software.
But the problem is that that software isn't free to begin with -- it could be, if the patent owner issued a free license, but it isn't without the court case either. Somebody else owns the monopoly on that invention. >> It is unarguably superior that source should always be available for a >> free software project. You cannot say the same for prohibiting >> lawsuits. > > It is not unarguably the case that source requirements are always > beneficial to free software. I could easily give an example where > they were detrimental, and the development of a free software project > was furthered by dropping them. (I'm not interested in debating whether > this was actually so or not; it was, and I'll leave it at that for the > sake of avoiding pointless tangents.) You're claiming an existence proof but failing to show the example. I don't believe you -- nothing personal, but how can that be allowed as a successful argument? I suspect you're looking at a case where you *bought* effort towards a software project by permitting source-disclosure requirements to be cancelled. -Brian -- Brian Sniffen [EMAIL PROTECTED]
