Re: Agenda for board meeting on November 3rd

[Josh Triplett <josh joshtriplett org>]

On Fri, Nov 06, 2015 at 04:40:35PM -0500, Richard Stallman wrote:
>   > > I suspect that uploading to the app store also requires nonfree software,
>   > > but I don't know for certain.
>
>   > To the best of my knowledge it does not, though some effort is required
>   > to avoid it.  (See some of the recent discussion about the Android SDK
>   > and its EULA, for instance.)  It's possible that it requires proprietary
>   > JavaScript; I have not personally tested that.
>
> Proprietary Javascript is what I suspect Google requires.
>
> However, this is a secondary issue -- the primary one is that the user
> must run nonfree software to install the app from there.  Leading
> others to run nonfree software is more grave than using nonfree
> software yourself.

Agreed.  I think it's important to make Free Software available for
proprietary platforms as a bridge to draw people in; I have a personal
fondness for that approach as it's the path I took myself (replacing
most of my regularly-used apps on Windows with Free Software
replacements that also ran on GNU/Linux, and then replacing Windows with
Debian GNU/Linux).

>   > While I do think we should recommend fdroid.org as preferable and only
>   > link to it (such as in links from the GNOME application and its
>   > documentation), and avoid linking to a version in the Play store (e.g.
>   > "To use the Foo feature, install the Foo application for Android,
>   > available via https://f-droid.org/...";), that doesn't preclude making
>   > the application available via the Google Play store for users who
>   > already have that installed.
>
> That's true.  The program's developers, or others, can put it in the
> Google store if they wish.
>
> My point is that the GNOME Foundation should not do so.

That seems like a reasonable point; I'm somewhat inclined to agree for a
different reason, namely that the GNOME Foundation should on principle
not be paying the entry fee for a proprietary app store, however small. :)

That said, I do think it's reasonable for the description of the
application *in* the Play store to reference GNOME, in the course of
explaining that it works with a specific Free Software program, that the
recommended place to obtain the app is f-droid, and providing links to
GNOME.