Definition of Open Source [was Re: pine: UW permission to distribute]

[Michael Tiemann]

The "someone suggesting the approach" was me.  I thought it was vitally
important that Fedora give us the honest view of what free software and
open source were capable of delivering :now:

By being able to see not only how great (but perhaps broken) or how lame
(and incomplete) the free/open source solution was, we'd know, and the
community would know, where efforts were needed.

Moreover, it was my opinion that there were many important contributors
who would be uninterested in making Fedora their preferred platform for
development if we incorporated proprietary software into the core.  I
argued that it was better to give people the option to package and
maintain proprietary software on top of a free core than to exclude
people who reject non-free software.

I am trying to finish a draft statement for discussion on Fedora
policies and processes.  This draft is /not/ an official Red Hat
position (at least not yet).  It's my best attempt to synthesize what
was said, what was done, what was meant, and what should be from sources
I've been reviewing over the past 3 weeks.  These include historical
(and now out-dated Red Hat documents), fedora.us, fedora.redhat.com, and
my own opinions about which distinctions should be made and why.  I am
hoping that this document, if not ultimately adopted directly, at least
influences not only fedora.redhat.com, but helps integrate the much
larger community, including the many RPM distribution sites, those who
inhabit "Fedora Extras", etc.

This document takes an explicit position on the what and why of open
source and free software, and about 10 other dimensions of the problem.

I also second the notion of creating fedora-legal as a place to have
licensing, trademark, and other legal-related discussions.

M

On Tue, 2004-07-20 at 16:44, Havoc Pennington wrote:
> On Tue, 2004-07-20 at 15:56, Jeff Spaleta wrote:
> > On Tue, 20 Jul 2004 14:52:58 -0500, Rex Dieter <rdieter at math.unl.edu> wrote:
> > > Thank you Havoc, that's exactly what I've been asking for.  I would say
> > > this should be reflected on fedora.redhat.com somewhere.
> > 
> > So havoc's opinion counts as being the official fedora opinion?
> > I'll have to remember that for future reference?
> > 
> 
> Please do! ;-) j/k
> 
> I don't know that there was ever a firm decision as in a vote was taken
> or some dictator laid down the law. I just remember someone suggesting
> this approach and I said "that sounds good to me" when asked, and I
> don't know if it went anywhere.
> 
> If anyone who's involved in the project has a really strongly felt
> opinion I guess it's on-topic for the list and the feedback is good,
> though many of us might be grumpy about a licensing thread. ;-)
> 
> Agree with the point that we have to address the leadership etc. issues
> and that it would be good to get this on the web site.
> 
> Havoc
> 
>