Re: [HACKERS] Re: Revised Copyright: is this morepalatable?

Philip Warner wrote:
>
> At 01:09 5/07/00 +0200, Jan Wieck wrote:
> >
> > So my focus isn't really on keeping open what once
> > became open - that'll take care for itself because someone
> > will be there taking the last open version and continue from
> > that.
>
> This is called 'faith', and is commendable, but I'm and old testament sort
> of person - a few thunderbolts never go amiss!
>
> I truly hope you are right, and that the result of Software Manufacturers
> Vs. The Hackers is not the destruction of open source software through
> extensive legal battles and intense self-interest.
>
> Am I correct in saying that you agree that the GPL is where we should be,
> but you want people to go there of their own free will?

Why do you continue to insist that GPL is superior to BSD? GPL is
BSD *with restrictions*. If someone comes along and sweeps up the
major developers:

A) Good for the major developers - they deserve to have large
sums of cash thrown their way, particularly for many of them who
have been working on this *for years*

B) The moment it happens, the project forks and another "Marc"
out-there offers to host development on his machine and the
process begins again. PostgreSQL exists despite Illustra's
existence.

This is not something new. SunOS, AIX, HPUX, etc. all have (at
one time or another) considerable BSD roots. And yet FreeBSD
still exists... All GPL does is 'poison' the pot by prohibiting
commercial spawns which may leverage the code. If someone makes
some money selling CommercialGres by integrating replication,
distributive, and parallel query, good for them.

Mike Mascari