Embedding Bazaar into C/C++ applications

[Russel Winder]

Stephen,

I delayed answering so as to avoid an emotional flame war.

On Sat, 2009-12-12 at 00:27 +0900, Stephen J. Turnbull wrote:
> Russel Winder writes:
>  
>  > Many people associate this practice of offering a licence at a lower
>  > cost than the anticipated cost of a threatened court case with the crime
>  > of extortion,
> 
> Good god, man, get a hold of yourself.

I'm afraid I am in full command.  I have been involved in three
incidents of this sort of bullying by large companies, and I find it a
real and present threat.

> In the case of Canonical, you're speaking of a company which makes a
> regular practice of freeing its most attractive products, and we're
> talking about offering a license which allows the licensee to
> *withhold* the privileges that Canonical normally offers to the users
> of its products.

I trust Canonical.  At least at the moment.  I avoid trying to predict
the future.

Sorry, I'm afraid I have lost the context of the particular case being
discussed here so I'll avoid speculating on poor data.  Whether right or
wrong, I am a supporter of GPL and LGPL and am not a fan of the idea of
"more permissive" licences being "business friendly", I think this is
guerilla marketing by those wishing to use volunteer effort for
proprietary product.  However this is a personal position and so my
problem.

> Not to mention that we're talking about simply asking the court to
> enforce rights granted by the duly elected representatives of the
> citizenry.

I suspect there may be an east-of-pond / west-of-pond divide here
regarding courts and politicians.  I suggest we avoid going there.

> You don't have to like the practice; I don't.  (Especially since the
> FSF is one of the foremost practictioners.)  But there's a big
> difference between "socially irresponsible" and "criminal".

Extortion is only "socially irresponsible" if you cannot afford to fight
the case as a civil suit or are not able to get the police / CPS (our
criminal prosecution service) to investigate.

I suspect this debate has gone beyond useful for this mailing list -- it
is now a "down the pub" debate -- so I suggest we let it lie.

-- 
Russel.
=============================================================================
Dr Russel Winder      Partner
                                            xmpp: russel at russel.org.uk
Concertant LLP        t: +44 20 7585 2200, +44 20 7193 9203
41 Buckmaster Road,   f: +44 8700 516 084   voip: sip:russel.winder at ekiga.net
London SW11 1EN, UK   m: +44 7770 465 077   skype: russel_winder
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 197 bytes
Desc: This is a digitally signed message part
Url : https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/bazaar/attachments/20091214/ab0720fb/attachment-0001.pgp