LWN.net Logo

Please tone down the GPL3 paranoia

From:  Bruce Perens <bruce-AT-perens.com>
To:  Rob Landley <rob-AT-landley.net>
Subject:  Please tone down the GPL3 paranoia
Date:  Wed, 13 Sep 2006 15:29:20 -0700
Cc:  busybox-AT-busybox.net
Archive-link:  Article, Thread

Folks,

I think it would be supportive of the rest of the free software
community to tone down the GPL3 paranoia until there is a GPL3.

When I created Busybox, the policy was that it could be distributed
under the GPL. There was no restriction to prevent future versions of
the GPL. Over time, my work has been submerged in that of other authors.
But IMO it would be respectful of the original author to continue to use
those license terms.

Later on, when there is a GPL3, you may decide not to accept GPL3-/only/
submissions to this project's source code repository so that the GPL2
can continue to be applied  to the entire project. But I hope that when
that time comes, you will remember that much of the success of this
package can be attributed to the use of a strong share-and-share-alike
license rather than a license that would have allowed improvements to
the package to be locked down in some way.

    Thanks

    Bruce


_______________________________________________
busybox mailing list
busybox@busybox.net
http://busybox.net/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/busybox


(Log in to post comments)

Copyright © 2006, Eklektix, Inc.
Comments and public postings are copyrighted by their creators.
Linux is a registered trademark of Linus Torvalds