[vorbis-dev] Richard Stallman responds.

Gregory Maxwell
2000-02-17T13:44:34Z

:)

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Thu, 17 Feb 2000 12:41:43 -0700 (MST)
From: Richard Stallman <rms@gnu.org>
To: greg@linuxpower.cx
Subject: Re: [vorbis-dev] Vorbis license terms?  (fwd)

Would you please post something saying that this statement about
my vies is drastically mistaken:

    Actually, RMS openly condemns any commercialization of software.  He also
    equates being paid for writing software with prostitution.

Neither of these is true.

I have nothing against getting paid for writing software; I've even
done that myself while working on GNU.  (Of course, the software I was
paid to write was free software.)  The Free Software Foundation also
hires people to write free software.

Other people get paid to write free software too, sometimes at
companies such as Red Hat, sometimes at universities, and sometimes
through individual consulting activities.  The GNU Project has a web
page specifically for advertising such job openings.

The GNU Project also supports commercial use of free software.  Free
software should be for everyone, including business.  In fact, if a
program prohibits commercial use or commercial distribution, that
means it is not free software.  From time to time I ask a developer to
please take away such a restriction and make a program free software.
I tried persuading the developers of Xv to do this, for example, but I
didn't succeed.  We need free software to replace Xv (although some
other programs do replace some of its functions).

Neither I nor the GNU Project object to commercialization per se, but
some approaches to commercializing a program are wrong for other
reasons.  For example, imposing proprietary restrictions on the
program is wrong, because that denies the users their freedom.
Business in itself is not evil, but if a business method involves
taking away the customer's freedom, that particular business method is
wrong.

The best way to understand this is to compare it with the
environmental movement.  They demanded the closure of paper factories
that dumped poison in the nearby river, but they were not against
commerce or against making and selling paper.  They were only against
dumping poison in the river.  We're not against making a business
relating to software, or even against selling copies of software;
we're against denying the users the freedom to cooperate.

The goal of GNU GPL is to protect everyone's freedom to cooperate,
while being permissive in other respects.

Forking is a complex issue.  A fork is always bad, in a certain way,
because it is better if everyone works together.  However, sometimes a
fork is needed to serve the user's needs.  And if a program's
developer prohibits forks, the rest of the community does not have
freedom to develop the program as they see fit.

So we should all try to avoid making forks, except as a last resort;
but the *right* to fork is crucial, and we must defend it.