On Fri, Jan 30, 2004 at 04:20:10AM +0000, MJ Ray wrote: > I don't think RMS has ever claimed GFDL-covered works are free > software. Has he expressed an opinion on that, or are you using > telepathic devices?
GNU deals with this by defining software as equivalent to programs, and defining other digital works as non-software. Note, however, that they never seem to actually define the term "software" (if someone can point me at an official GNU definition of "software", please let me know). On the flip side, http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=software&r=67 defines software as The programs, routines, and symbolic languages that control the functioning of the hardware and direct its operation. And, while it's true that [for example] arbitrary ascii text documents do not have the same kinds of capabilities for controlling a computer as ascii text documents which confirm to the syntax of some programming languages, ascii is still a symbolic language which directs the computer to display text in a certain fashion. In my opinion, this is a fruitless distinction, not worth wasting much time on. If you want to define different classes of documents, and treat them differently, you should explicitly define those classes of documents [and you should also deal with the cases where one document falls into several different classes]. Finally, note that RMS does claim that GFDL licensed works are free (that's what the "F" stands for) -- it's just that he has a different standard of freedom in that context. -- Raul
