Re: Debian readline/libedit breakage

Jason,

* Jason Earl (jearl@notengoamigos.org) wrote:
> Or he could just read this essay from the FSF website:

Which is all about the GPL's "can't be *more* restrictive"
requirement.  That doesn't apply in this case, sorry.  Reading back
through the thread from December of 2000, I see the same was pointed
out then.

The BSD license clearly does not add any restrictions on distribution
that the GPL itself doesn't have (indeed, it's the other way around- the
GPL adds a bunch of additional restrictions), hence, there's no reason
to be concerned wrt community PG.

Would RMS like it to be GPL'd?  Sure, of course he does, but that
doesn't mean he can use readline to somehow make us relicense it.  If we
were releasing PG under a *more* restrictive license than the GPL, it'd
be different (which was the whole issue with ncftp, for those who read
the 2000 thread..).  In *that* case, we'd have to make the source
available under a license which *didn't* impose any requirements beyond
what the GPL imposed, but we're already doing that!

>         At least one application program is free software today
>         specifically because that was necessary for using Readline.

Note that they say *free software* here- that doesn't mean it has to be
GPL, but that the source has to be available to the user without
additional restrictions on it.  Here's the relevant quote from the GPL:

------------------
You may not impose any further restrictions on the recipients' exercise
of the rights granted herein.
------------------
(Section 6)

> IANAL, but it is hard to recommend relying on a reading of the GPL that
> is inconsistent with the folks that wrote the license.

What you're argueing isn't actually a position the GPL folks hold
though and seems to be built based on *no* reading of the GPL itself and
just an interpretation of how FSF has applied the GPL to other
situations which are drastically different from ours. :(

I'd like to see where someone from FSF, Debian, or anywhere else, where
they've actually even *asked* us to relicense PG under the GPL.
Thanks,
    Stephen