This is a description of the changes my proposal would introduce
to the current social contract.
Comparison of my proposal with the current social contract:
Section 1.
Title -- changed capitalization to correspond with
Andrew Suffield's proposed editorial changes
First sentence -- got rid of Linux dependency (to allow
for Hurd and BSD distributions). Old statement was somewhat
non-grammatical and didn't really state what debian was about,
so I fleshed out the description of Debian.
In the process, I changed the nature of the statement from a
promise to statement of purpose. In my opinion, a promise implies
that we might have a conflicting agenda but we're constraining
ourselves because of this agreement. In my opinion, a statement
of purpose is much more pervasive and fundamental.
Old: We promise to keep the Debian GNU/Linux Distribution
entirely free software.
New: Debian exists to distribute a general purpose system
composed of entirely free software.
Second sentence -- rephrased it to comply with the recent
constitutional amendment [where DFSG is a separate document
from the social contract).
Old: As there are many definitions of free software, we include
the guidelines we use to determine if software is "free" below.
New: As there are many definitions of free software, we use
the "Debian Free Software Guidelines" to determine if software
is free.
Third sentence -- added free software to this statement of support.
I think this is important as a part of keeping non-free software
in perspective.
Old: We will support our users who develop and run non-free
software on Debian, but we will never make the system depend on
an item of non-free software.
New: We will also support our users who develop and run other
software on Debian -- free or non-free -- but we will never make
the system depend on non-free software.
Sections 2, 3 and 4.
My proposed changes here are identical to those in Andrew Suffield's
editorial changes draft.
http://lists.debian.org/debian-vote/2004/debian-vote-200401/msg01526.html
These are simple cleanups which should not change the meaning of
the social contract. I think they're a good idea, and so have
incorporated them.
Section 5.
Title -- Changed capitalization to conform to style in Andrew
Suffield's editorial changes draft. Also, replaced the word
"Programs" with "Software" to make the association with the DFSG
more transparent. Since the DFSG is no longer a part of the same
document as the social contract, I think it's important to rephrase,
where possible, to make their association obvious.
Old: 5. Programs That Don't Meet Our Free-Software Standards
Mew: 5. Software that doesn't meet our free-software standards
Sentence 1 -- added a statement that not all of our users depend
on non-free software. This is a part of keeping the non-free
distribution in perspective.
Old: We acknowledge that some of our users require the use
of programs that don't conform to the Debian Free Software
Guidelines.
New: We acknowledge that some, but not all, of our users require
the use of software which does not conform to the Debian Free
Software Guidelines.
Sentence 2 -- expanded on it, indicating the purpose of the
non-free archive. Also replaced "FTP" with the more generic
term "internet" (to include support for other protocols, such
as HTTP).
Old: We have created "contrib" and "non-free" areas in our
FTP archive for this software.
New: In order to accommodate these users, we have created
"contrib" and "non-free" areas in our internet archive.
Sentence 3/4 (old) 3 (new) -- I eliminated the phrase "is not part
of the Debian system". I believe that the purpose of this phrase was
to keep non-free in perspective. However, since "the Debian system"
isn't defined, there are a number of ambiguous interpretations of
this phrase, including some people thinking Debian shouldn't support
that software at all.
Also, I added an explicit statement that the software we distribute in
"non-free" must satisfy at least some of our guidelines.
Also, I've incorporated the cautionary statement which was sentence 4
of the old contract, but I've made it generic where the old statement
was specific to CD manufacturers.
This is probably the most important change in my proposal -- all
other changes are intended to reinforce this changed statement.
It's important to point out that even our non-free software is
in some sense of the word free software. It's important to point
out at least some of the weaknesses of non-free software.
Old: The software in these directories is not part of the
Debian system, although it has been configured for use with
Debian. We encourage CD manufacturers to read the licenses of
software packages in these directories and determine if they
can distribute that software on their CDs.
New: The software in "non-free" satisfies some, but not all,
of our guidelines and we do not guarantee all software in the
non-free area may be distributed in other ways.
Sentence 5 (old) 4 (new) -- the last sentence in the old social
contract seemed to be almost apologetic. It was an attempt to
show that we offer support for non-free software, but it focussed
on the packages we distribute which represent a tiny fraction of
all non-free software. I've replaced that with a statement which
indicates our support of a couple classes of standards which are
relevant to users of non-free software. These standards did not
exist when the social contract was written, but I think mentioning
support of them is better than trying to pretend that our few
package in non-free represent all of our support for non-free
software. As an added bonus, these standards are also of some
benefit to free software.
Old: Thus, although non-free software isn't a part of Debian,
we support its use, and we provide infrastructure (such as our
bug-tracking system and mailing lists) for non-free software
packages.
New: For those who need to run software we do not distribute,
free or non-free, we support worthy application binary interface
standards and namespace management standards.
Sentence 5 (new) -- The old social contract didn't really say
anything in support of moving users from non-free software to using
free software. So I added a sentence describing our support for this
kind of activity. As an added bonus, this sentence indicates our
support for users of free software who do not use non-free software
directly but who must work with others who do.
New: Additionally, we will work to find, package and support
free alternatives to non-free software so people who use only
free software can work with users of non-free software.
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