On Feb 18, 2008 10:21 PM, <w9ya@qrparci.net> wrote:
On Mon, 18 Feb 2008, w9ya@qrparci.net wrote:
More to the point: Arch *does* have packages in the binary repos with licensing provisions of much the same limitations as those quoted in the discussions here in this thread about google-earth. And I am speaking about stuff that specifically does NOT allow copying across a network for distribution purposes and/or business use et al, single machine, no laptop mobile use and so forth. AND while these packages are not allowed in Debian for the same reasons as was mentioned in the latest emails herein concerning google-earth ArchLinux DOES have them RIGHT NOW in the binary repos.
SO.... *IF* this was pulled because it has a "non-free" license, that should NOT have been such a reflexive action IMHO, again in as much as Arch has plenty of those kinds of packages already in the binary repos.
What packages are you referring to? Do you have a list?
Thanks for writing;
In fact I found one such package in the first 45 seconds I went to look for such things. I found a similar package with a little bit more work, but not much more than a minute or two and some piping. i.e. Finding them would not be any more difficult than it was for the fella that found google-earth in the community repo and brought it to the attention of this email list within mere hours of my placing into the repo.
BUT any list I would have is certainly NOT going to be exhaustive or even indicative of ANYTHING. i.e. I am the WRONG person to ask. Perhaps asking the fellow that found google-earth for some of the other packages that also have similar to essentially the same restrictions on distribution, copying, usage and/or handling might be a great idea !
Perhaps it is also a good time to properly define what kinds of things would be on such a list ? At one time, many years ago this was defined for Arch. But, of course, there is a much different group of developers and so forth now. And many things were allowed many years ago that might well be no welcomed if google-earth's restrictions and it's subsequent removal are to be a form of milestone today. <- Again it is hardly my place to decide such things, so I would very much prefer not to be asked for any more opinion on this matter of what kinds of things are to be allowed or not.
If it WAS my decision then once something concrete is decided as to what will be SPECIFICALLY allowed in the matter of non-free distribution, copy, or usage restrictions; someone could then go into the four binary repos and weed those things out. <- Which I am guess is what you are after when you ask me for a list of what I had found. Again, it is NOT my place to be involved in such decisions OR actions.
Of course, and as I have mentioned before in this matter, these thoughts of what MIGHT be done are merely my opinions and I have absolutely no desire to lead in any way with these matters.
Again, I would like to also thank both you and the group here for being so polite to date with this matter. I could well imagine other less attractive ways of handling this matter so I appreciate that this was handled with proper and kindly restraint of emotions. In fact, I appreciate it very much.
tl;dr Eric, he is right in the sense that we have *some* non-free packages, but our list is really small: acroread has odd redistribution rules the msfonts are iffy, last I checked, but that may have changed the codecs package is still in the repos Hmmm... we got rid of ion3 and the only binary-only packages we have left are video drivers.... I'm at a loss pulling from memory