From: jbotz@sophia.smith.edu (Jurgen Botz)
Subject: Re: Fund raising at the FSF
Organization: Smith College
Date: Mon, 4 Jan 1993 20:04:57 GMT

In article <1993Jan3.174518.18964@husc3.harvard.edu> zeleny@husc10.harvard.edu (Michael Zeleny) writes:
>JB:
>>It /is/ free in the sense of being distributed at no cost---as you stated
>>above, like TeX you an ftp it from a number of Internet nodes. 
>
>Insofar as no Internet node can function as the final destination of
>any program, the fact that GNU is made so available, does not amount
>to free distribution.

Huh?!?  Word games... how about: "insofar as no magnetic tape can
function as the final destination of any program, if the FSF were
giving away mag-tapes with GNU on them the software still wouldn't
be free."  The level of semantic distortion to which you stoop is
sickening...

>Again, I have no ready access to a tape drive

Again?  You didn't say that before.  

>at my email site.  Nor do billions of other potential beneficiaries of
>the Foundation's munificence.

Billions of other potential beneficiaries?  How many people own/have
access to computers capable of running GNU software?

>Get it through your head, -- most
>people have no option, but to pay for distribution in one way or
>another.

Most people?  Who are most people?  Most people who use Unix software
that *I* know have access to the Internet or at least have a @#$#@%@#
modem on their machine and can use UUCP.

>Again, this is not what I find objectionable, except in
>conjunction with the following.
>
>JB:
>>It also /is/ free "in the sense of being distributed without imposing an
>>obligation of its /recipient/" (emphasis mine).  The obligation imposed
>>by the GNU public license applies only to those who wish to /redistribute/
>>GNU software in some form or another.
>
>Please try to understand my position.  As a sometime programmer, I am
>placed under an automatic obligation to attach the GPL license to any
>piece of my code that contains the most minute fraction of GNU, quite
>regardless of whether I wish to redistribute it.

And clearly when using GNU software you can't be responsible for
constantly being on guard that a piece of GNU code doesn't suddenly
slip into one of your programs...

>The fact that a user
>who never copies, distributes, or modifies GNU, is not placed under
>restriction in any *remaining* activities, does not imply that he is
>not placed under a legal *obligation* to FSF.  An obligation is a
>moral or legal bond that restricts or eliminates the possibility of
>action;

*sigh*... well, then I've got some more news for you.  You're already
under obligation to the FSF, as well as to every other organization
and individual in the world.  You're under obligation not to brake
into the FSF's offices and physically steal their code, for example.
And you're under obligation not to violate the GNU license because 
that license is the legal right of the FSF assigned via copyright
law, *regardless* of whether or not you have ever seen or used a 
GNU program, or touched the distribution medium containing a GNU
program, or whatever.  The obligation is independent of the concept
of "receiving" the software, using the software, or writing programs
that are derived from GNU software.

>my difference from Stallman, now as it was over seven years
>ago, is that I regard his imposition of a *legal* bond as wholly
>incompatible with the billing of "Free Software".

Well, and I disagree.  I say that the software is "Free" in the
truest sense of the word to most... *I* think of it as free, because
for my purposes it is free, as free as it gets.  If it is not free
for your purposes... tough, I consider your purposes dishonorable.

- J. Botz