Re: Can you be free and non-copyleft at the same time?

[Sam Vilain <sam hydro gen nz>]

Wayne Schuller <w.schuller@gpph.unimelb.edu.au> writes:

> >Maybe there should be a licence between the LGPL and the GPL that
> >allows free software to link to it only; ie if the license is anything
> >up to as loose as BSD.  Then somehow make it a license violation to
> >make the linked code non-free.
> No the whole point is that the BSD licence isn't good enough. If it's not
> copylefted, how can it really be free?

The BSD/whatever code is exploitable - but as soon as the BSD licence
is bastardised^H^H^Hcommercialised, then you lose the right to use the
Quasi-LGPL code.

So you can still exploit the BSDtop program or the MPLmozilla, but you
have to re-write libGtop for MStop or Netscape.

This should perhaps be thought about by someone at the FSF (gosh, I've
just noticed RMS is in the CC: list :-)).  A licence that fits
somewhere between the LGPL and the GPL.  A
"free-but-not-copyleft-software compatible" GPL.
-- 
Sam Vilain, sam@whoever.com         work: sam.vilain@unisys.com
http://www.hydro.gen.nz                home: sam@hydro.gen.nz