Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!shelby!apple!apple.com!desnoyer
From: desnoyer@apple.com (Peter Desnoyers)
Newsgroups: gnu.misc.discuss
Subject: Re: Why I do not support GNU
Message-ID: <4792@internal.Apple.COM>
Date: 17 Oct 89 17:50:11 GMT
Sender: usenet@Apple.COM
Distribution: gnu
Organization: Apple Computer, Inc.
Lines: 38
References:<8910160520.AA01740@sugar-bombs.ai.mit.edu> <SJA.89Oct16125938@sirius.hut.fi> <NELSON.89Oct16205843@image.clarkson.edu> <47006@bbn.COM>

In article <47006@bbn.COM> cosell@bbn.com (Bernie Cosell) writes:
> }   You can do anything with public domain code, including sell it.
> }   Suppose an "evil software hoarder" (aka the bogey man) grabs your
> }   program, makes proprietary modifications to it and sells it for money.
> }
> }The problem with public domain code is this: If I want my code to be
> }and remain freely available, I can't put it in the public domain.  If
> }I do, someone can take my code and mix it with theirs.  My code 
> }effectively becomes theirs.  This is not acceptable to me.
> 
> I missed part of the reasoning there: the 'mixer' didn't take your code
> out of the public domain.  It is still there and still freely
> available.  Now, the *modified* version of your code [after the mixing]
> may or may not be available, but why do you care: *your* code is still
> out there.  Many folk, for example, would *prefer* that after-mixing
> versions of their code NOT be publicly available because defects in the
> 'improvements' tarnish the apparent quality and utility of the
> original, unblemished code.

Do you use the X window system on a workstation like a MicroVax or a Sun? 
X is "public domain". The program running on your machine is copyright by 
the workstation manufacturer who ported the code. The X people are 
probably comfortable with this, as they have achieved the goal of creating 
a widely-used standard. The FSF, however, is probably not interested in 
going to a lot of effort so that other companies can copyright FSF work 
and prevent it from being freely distributed.

How many machines do you think GCC would have been ported to if it were 
public domain? Probably about as many as now; maybe a few more. How many 
of these ports would you be able to use? Whichever ones the FSF wrote - 
VAX and 68xxx (I think). Period. The rest of them would be proprietary. 
That is probably a good example of the rationale behind the copyleft, as 
well as some of its results.


                                      Peter Desnoyers
                                      Apple ATG
                                      (408) 974-4469