Path: utzoo!utgpu!watmath!uunet!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!AI.MIT.EDU!rms
From: rms@AI.MIT.EDU
Newsgroups: gnu.gcc
Subject: (none)
Message-ID: <8906030105.AA00339@sugar-bombs.ai.mit.edu>
Date: 3 Jun 89 01:05:55 GMT
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    My bottom line is that GNU software *is* *proprietary* too!! It cannot
    be used freely by others.

I will address this below.

			       It is effectively share-ware -- to use it,
    we have to support your political philosophy.

This sentence depends for its impact on two meanings of the word
"support".  

If "support" means agree with--which is usually what it means in the
context of "supporting a philosophy"--this statement would be a sharp
criticism, except that it is false.  I clearly have no power to compel
GNU users to think one thing or another, and the general public
license doesn't say anything about requirements for users' opinions.

If "support" means behave in certain ways--such as, not develop any
proprietary software containing the GNU software--then the statement
is true, but not particularly shocking.  

						   Calling the software
    "free" under these circumstances is an interesting use of doublespeak.

This is no doublespeak, just as it is not doublespeak to say that
Americans are free when they are not allowed the freedom to sell
themselves into slavery.  That prohibition may seem a galling
restriction to those who would like to buy slaves.  

I am tempted to say that the true doublespeak is when people call
public domain software and X windows "free"--when thousands of users
are receiving copies under standard proprietary licenses: they can't
share it or change it.

However, that would be exaggeration.  Neither of these is doublespeak.
The fact is, we can either have inalienable rights or we can have the
right to sell away our rights.  Both of these are freedom of a sort. 

I think that the inalienable right is more important for sharing and
changing software.  You have the right to disapprove of my choice; but
that is no excuse for insulting me persistently with terms like
"doublespeak".  My definition of "free software" is not the only
reasonable definition.  But it is a reasonable definition.  And that
is the best term I know for the meaning.  

      What I
    produce will not be marketable.  We don't do company proprietary
    research here -- this is a university!

I didn't say that you did.  It is the companies whose support you want
which do this.  They want compilers for which they have the "freedom"
to give the users no freedom; and you want to use such a compiler, not
because you yourself would like to take away anyone else's freedom,
but because these companies offer you research support if you get them
such a compiler.  

I won't say that you are malicious in this.  All else being equal, I
would like you to have support for your research.  But I am not
willing to capitulate to these companies so that you could have
support for your research.  I don't believe their victory is
inevitable.