> JC> I object to what I feel would be a policy which narrows the > JC> definition of "truly free" software beyond that which the social > JC> contract and DFSG currently provide. > > Then you've proven yourself to be a legalist, and not somebody who is > capable of actually *writing* policy. Policy writers have to be > flexible and dynamic, understanding that the status quo is only our > current approximation of perfection.
My two little pennies worth. I'm sort of against the "pure" concept, but only because main is _supposed_ to be pure, by it's own definition. What I think Joseph is missing is that putting things in contrib does not make them non-free, nor does it say that Debian makes it non-free. Policy states that things in contrib _must_ be DFSG compliant, and by that we have a right to put things in there that aren't suitable for main, but still meets the guidelines. Now it seems that contrib wants to bleed over to main, and some people (Joseph) are concerned that it's a "double standard" to start putting things into contrib that should be. Well guess what, it is and should be. Some people are concerned (Joseph) that putting things in contrib makes it seem second hand to our users....so what. This is a Debian distribution...not program foo's redistribution point. We don't put software in here for the sake of that one piece of software, we do it for the sake of creating an OS for our users and the community, not for any single program to be "in the lime light". My opinion, get back to the roots of our goals and gut main to meet the standards that Debian was built on. Don't water down the issues or pretty soon we will have "holy, pure, main, dusty, dirty, trash, non-free, pure-evil, and satanic" sections. NOTE: Joseph, please don't reply to this, as we both know our opinions completely differ, and no matter what my statements, you will disagree. (you probably disagree that we disagree, but that's a trivial point). Ben
