OpenGo: A Clarification (from rms@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx)

[Stuart Cracraft <cracraft@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

[The following email is from Richard Stallman (rms@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx).]

I would like to make a distinction between commercial distribution and
proprietary versions, because I think that people may be identifying
these two different issues.

The issue that I've raised has to do with commercial distribution of
free software: companies like Red Hat and Yggdrasil, and non-profits
like the FSF, that sell collections of free software.  Sellers like
this preserve the original distribution terms, giving customers all
the freedoms that the original authors gave them.

People have now raised a distinct, separate issue: what if someone
wants to use all or part of OpenGo in a modified program and restrict
that program, so that it would be proprietary rather than free
software?  Should that be permitted or not?

If you asked me about that issue, I would say, "Don't allow that--it's
better to insist that modified versions of OpenGo must be free
software."  See http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/pragmatic.html.

But my main point is that these are two separate issues, two separate
decisions for you to make.  If you permit selling copies of OpenGo as
free software, as I've asked, you still have a separate choice about
proprietary versions.

If you decide to disallow proprietary versions, then you can do that
by using the GNU GPL as distribution terms.  If you decide to allow
proprietary add-on code, I recommend using the LGPL.  If you decide to
allow proprietary versions, I recommend using the X11 license, because
it does the job unambiguously and does not have the problems of the
BSD license.  (See http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/bsd.html regarding
the problems of the BSD license.)