The debian-private mailing list leak, part 1. Volunteers have complained about Blackmail. Lynchings. Character assassination. Defamation. Cyberbullying. Volunteers who gave many years of their lives are picked out at random for cruel social experiments. The former DPL's girlfriend Molly de Blanc is given volunteers to experiment on for her crazy talks. These volunteers never consented to be used like lab rats. We don't either. debian-private can no longer be a safe space for the cabal. Let these monsters have nowhere to hide. Volunteers are not disposable. We stand with the victims.
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Re: "Social Contract" - final pass

On Thu, 26 Jun 1997, Bruce Perens wrote:

> From: Christian Schwarz <schwarz@monet.m.isar.de>
> I agree this is sub-optimal, but it is unfortunately required for a number
> of programs currently in the distribution. We should discourage people from
> making this restriction.

Please don't let us define "free software" based on any existing licenses.

As far as I have understood the intent of the "social contract", the
Debian project tries to make a "contract" with its users, that explains
our goals in the project. That's an excellent idea, IMO.

I don't think we should lower our high demands on "free software licenses"
just to get a few other programs into "main". These packages could reside
in "non-free" as well.

I think this paper should be used as reference for other authors of free
software if they consider rewriting their licenses. Such, we should not
make any compromises here.

I can understand the authors very well, that want to get credit for their
work by having their name on the program and don't allow any source code
modifications (they don't get any money for it, since its "somewhat-free
software"). But I also think that software can only be considered to be
completely free, if it can be modified and distributed by others as well.
The GNU project and the Linux kernel wouldn't be there where they are
today, if they would have such restrictions.

> > ``The license may restrict source-code from being distributed in modified
> > form _only_ if the license allows the distribution of "patch files"
> > with the source code for the purpose of modifying the program at build
> > time _and_ if the license allows the distribution of modified sources if
> > the name of the software or the version number is changed.''
> 
> We might take this up with the authors concerned. Qmail (djb), Ncurses (eric),
> what other programs?

Yes, please let us talk to the authors about their licenses.


(I'm sorry that I join this discussion so late. I missed the start since I
was very busy.)


Thanks,

Chris

--                  Christian Schwarz
                     schwarz@monet.m.isar.de, schwarz@schwarz-online.com,
Debian is looking     schwarz@debian.org, schwarz@mathematik.tu-muenchen.de
for a logo! Have a
look at our drafts     PGP-fp: 8F 61 EB 6D CF 23 CA D7  34 05 14 5C C8 DC 22 BA
at    http://fatman.mathematik.tu-muenchen.de/~schwarz/debian-logo/


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