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Free Software Foundation Europe Newsletter
1. Heading towards the GPLv3 2. Karsten Gerloff at the ATTAC Germany summer academy 3. AFFS General Meeting 4. Improving the infrastructure 1. Heading towards the GPLv3 The world wide network of Free Software Foundations is currently preparing the next step in the evolution of the GNU General Public License, the most used license in the Free Software world. While there is no doubt that the current version (GPLv2) holds in court and is applicable all over the world, the GPLv3 will address aspects that were not as pressing or did not exist at the time the GPLv2 was written, like programs that are used over the internet. Other issues likely to be of interest are software patents, compatibility with other copyleft licenses, DRM and TCP. The Free Software Foundation Europe is determined to put as much time and energy into this project as it needs to make the GPLv3 as powerful and successful as the GPLv2 is. The FSFE has set up a mailing list for public discussion of GPLv3, to which you are invited to subscribe at https://mail.fsfeurope.org/mailman/listinfo/gplv3 2. Karsten Gerloff at the ATTAC Germany summer academy Karsten Gerloff was asked to give a speech about the current developments within the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) and the A2K (Access To Knowledge) Treaty at ATTAC Germany's summer academy in Goettingen. His talk was part of a seminar on intellectual monopoly rights. Karsten was also invited to attend a meeting of the ATTAC "Knowledge Commons" working group. 3. AFFS General Meeting On 13 August, FSFE's UK based associate organisation AFFS held its General Meeting. Ciaran O'Riordan held a talk about what has been achieved with regards to software patentability, and how the road ahead looks like. 4. Infrastructure As August was a quite unspectacular and not many events were scheduled this month, the FSFE team worked on what could be considered "house keeping" -- improving the infrastructure so we will be ready for the next work-intensive months. A new asterisk server allowing Voice Over IP connections within the team and the reorganisation of mail distribution lists and internal data repositories should help improving communication, which is always a challenge when people are spread all over Europe. The Fellowship was another target of improvements: while the current system works well and stable, the time has come for the first round of improvements. A major point is the upcoming migration of the portal site www.fsfe.org from Plone to ez Publish. You can find a list of all FSF Europe newsletters on http://www.fsfeurope.org/news/newsletter.en.html _______________________________________________ Press-release mailing list Press-release@fsfeurope.org https://mail.fsfeurope.org/mailman/listinfo/press-release (Log in to post comments)
I hope GPLv3 will never come Posted Sep 6, 2005 5:21 UTC (Tue) by proski (subscriber, #104) [Link] GPLv2 carefully balances interests of copyright holders (developers) and other parties (users, who can be developers too). Give more power to copyright holders, and users (including valuable contributors) will turn to other projects. Give more power to users, and companies like Trolltech will revert to less free licensing.I'm afraid that any material change in the license that would cause a significant part of developers stay with GPLv2, while another significant part of developers would applaud and actively adopt the change. Thus, changing the license would be divisive for the community using GPLv2 now. Giving the reluctance of FSF to disallow the invariant sections and fix the DRM clause in the FDL, my only hope that the GPLv3 is delayed as much as possible. If FSF decides to prohibit distribution of GPLv3 licensed software on DRM'ed media, it could be soon impossible to distribute free software using the same channels as proprietary firmware. Just think how far would free sofware advance if it were only legal to distribute it on read-write media (i.e. floppies and CD-RW are OK, but CD-ROMs are not).
I hope GPLv3 will never come Posted Sep 6, 2005 6:59 UTC (Tue) by tajyrink (subscriber, #2750) [Link] I think FSF is willing to fix FDL, they're just not doing it overnight. And GPLv3 is even more important, so don't expect it anytime soon... but they will use what they've learned from the problems with FDL, so that the communication would be better in the future.
In general, I hate how much of even free software communication is about marketing skills :) Very few really understand these things, but FUD can be spread even inside the free / open source software community. Gathering the right people (representing different point of views that are relevant) to comment, discuss and finally say "yes" at the same time is always difficult.
GPLv3 Posted Sep 6, 2005 20:03 UTC (Tue) by coriordan (guest, #7544) [Link] The GPL is not about creating some perfect balance that should never be touched; it's about preserving freedoms for software users. The legal and technical environment has changed since GPLv2 was published. GPLv3 won't change the goal of the GPL, it will only update the implementation details needed to achieve the old goals. The GFDL was badly handled by FSF, in my personal opinion, but they don't seem to be about to replicate that process. There will be a 12-month public consultation period for the GPLv3. For more information, see the GPL Version 3: Background to Adoption from FSF, and the recent FSFE press release about GPL Version 3 Development and Publicity Project. Also, the GFDL is set to be updated, but this will happen after GPLv3.
GPLv3 Posted Sep 6, 2005 23:40 UTC (Tue) by xoddam (subscriber, #2322) [Link] > The GPL is not about creating some perfect balance that should> never be touched No, but arguably its success is because it struck that balance so well. If software authors didn't choose the GPL, their users' freedoms would not be preserved by it. Any revision of the GPL should aim to strike an equivalent, if not identical, balance between the interests of authors and users.
GPLv3 Posted Sep 7, 2005 15:07 UTC (Wed) by coriordan (guest, #7544) [Link] Remember that changes in the GPL don't have to affect any such balance. One example is the plan to publish the GPL in multiple languages. Another one is easing the license proliferation problem by solving trivial problems or wording problems which other bodies have stated as their reason for drafting a custom license. Increasing compatibility with other free software licenses is yet another. Nudging some balances will be discussed, and I'm some sure such plans will be implemented. Changes in the technical and legal environment have been nudging the balances for 14 years, some of these will have to be righted or at least prevented from continuing, but making sure that the majority of GPL'd software users and copyright holders are happy with the changes is what the 12-month public consultation period is for.
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