[linux-audio-user] Free Music licenses: which to choose?

Frank Barknecht barknech at ph-cip.uni-koeln.de
Sun Sep 29 05:52:01 EDT 2002


Hi,
Ian Bell hat gesagt: // Ian Bell wrote:

> On Saturday 28 Sep 2002 3:42 pm, Frank Barknecht wrote:
> > A license that prohibits (things like) commercial use or making money
> > is not a "Free" license anymore.
> it is.  it is free as in 'freedom' to copy and redistribute.

No, it is not free. 

I imposes a restriction on free redistribution: You are not allowed to
redistribute and (&&) take money for it. This is a 'non-free'
restriction according to the Debian Free Software Guidelines and the
Open Source (tm) definition:

"1. Free Redistribution

  The license shall not restrict any party from selling or giving away
  the software as a component of an aggregate software distribution
  containing programs from several different sources. The license
  shall not require a royalty or other fee for such sale."

Also see http://www.opensource.org/docs/definition.php for the OS
definition. 

Free distribution including commercial distribution is very important.
Otherwise most of us couldn't comfortably run a Linux CD Distribution
from whatever vendor we bought it. 

Saying "You are not allowed to make money from my music" is a freedom 
reducing action, IMO. 

ciao
-- 
 Frank Barknecht                               _ ______footils.org__



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