Re: bias...

On Tue, 4 Jun 2002, Sean C. Farley wrote:

> On Tue, 4 Jun 2002 15:32, Francois Gouget wrote:
> 
> > You seem to have researched Stallman's views and life quite a bit. I
> > just hope you are also researching Wine as thoroughly so that you can
> > soon emit informed opinions.
> >
> > Here are a few starting points:
> >  * Gavriel State - TransGaming DirectX Release
> >    (You said you did not know which promise they made, now you know)
> >    http://www.winehq.com/hypermail/wine-devel/2000/12/0358.html
> 
> >From that post, I gather they have followed their promise.  I do not see
> what to complain about.  The code was released under the Aladdin Free
> Public License.  I assume they have not reached their set number since
> they have not release the code under the X11 license.

If that's the case, maybe they haven't broken their promise.  At the same 
time though, they should release numbers regarding the subscriptions (both 
actual and goal numbers), if they want credibility -- otherwise, there's no 
accountability, and the benefit of the doubt tends to shift over time, as 
seems to have happened against Transgaming...

> It sounds like they have a business model similar to Aladdin's
> Ghostscript except Aladdin waits a long period of time before changing
> the license as opposed to a certain amount of revenue.  Actually, how
> does Aladdin when it is time to change the license on the code?

Basically, Aladdin relicenses the previous versions of Ghostscript under 
the GPL when a new major release is made available under the AFPL.  While 
the AFPL is "fre beer" to users, it disallows commercial use, so as long as 
companies want to use the code, they'll pay for the newest version, or 
suffer with the older GNU version.

Actually, Aladdin probably wouldn't be relicensing as GNU at all, if it 
weren't for the fact that Stallman got Ghostscript's author to commit to 
placing ALL future versions under the GPL.  (I think the commitment was in 
writing.)  Ultimately, the author realized there are a loophole in the 
timing of when each future version ended up under the GPL, and so he took 
advantage of that loophole to allow Aladdin to make a successful business 
model.  (And it's been successful enough that he doesn't have to work a 
"day job" for a living.)

He didn't break his promise -- he HAS been making all future versions 
available under the GPL...  eventually.  Evidently the original commitment 
didn't specify that it would be immediately placed under the GPL.  If he 
had it to do over again, he said he wouldn't have made that commitment in 
the first place.  (Stallman tried to force him to turn over the copyright 
to the FSF, but he flatly refused.  Since the alternative was not to have 
a PostScript interpreter for GNU, Stallman ultimately backed down on that.)

> Also, I notice that this came out at the end of 2000.  If DirectX
> development was down in 2000, how did the announcement at the very end
> of the year effect any development prior to the announcement?

I'm not sure if it would have -- unless there were private messages sent 
before this public announcement...

> Did they release the DirectDraw code as they promised?

Good question.  Did they?

Deven