On Sat, 16 Dec 2006, Ricardo Galli wrote:
> As you probably know, the GPL, the FSF, RMS or even GPL "zealots" never tried
> to change or restrict "fair use". GPL[23] covers only to "distibution" of the
> covered program. The freedom #0 says explicitly: "right to use the program
> for any purpose".
I'm sorry, but you're just rewriting history.
The FSF very much _has_ tried to make "fair use" a very restricted issue.
The whole reason the LGPL exists is that people realized that if they
don't do something like that, the GPL would have been tried in court, and
the FSF's position that anything that touches GPL'd code would probably
have been shown to be bogus.
In reality, if the FSF actually believed in "fair use", they would just
have admitted that GNU libc could have continued to be under the GPL, and
that any programs that link against it are obviously not "derived" from
it.
But no. The FSF has very much tried to confuse and muddle the issue, and
instead have claimed that projects like glibc should be done under the
"Lesser" GPL.
That's just idiocy, but it works as a way to defuse the problem that the
FSF has always had with admitting that not only _they_ have "fair use"
rights, but others have them too.
Do you REALLY believe that a binary becomes a "derived work" of any random
library that it gets linked against? If that's not "fair use" of a library
that implements a standard library definition, I don't know what is.
And yes, the FSF really has tried to push that totally insane argument.
So don't tell me that the FSF honors "fair use". They say they do, but
they only seem to honor it when it helps _their_ argument, not when it
helps "those evil people who try to take advantage of our hard work".
The fact is, if you accept fair use, you have to accept it for other
people to take advantage of too. Fair use really isn't just a one-way
street.
Linus
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