How about another point of view? However, i wouln't even start writing
that message, because the whole discussion is pointless. Why DJB does
not release his sources under any other license? May be because he
doesn't want to. Why not just to go and ask him, instead of asking
OpenBSD misc?

On Wed, Sep 05, 2001 at 11:22:25AM +1000, Darren Reed wrote:
> In some mail from J.C. Roberts, sie said:
> [...]
> > If he really believes his software and ideas are so great, he should
> > have the guts to put them under the BSD license and let the public
> > decide whether or not his way is the best way doing things.
>
> Actually, I think the problem is fairly easy to understand.
>
> What he's effectively saying is that if you download djbdns he wants you
> to know that it is _the_ djbdns and not some modified version of djbdns
> which may have a security bug introduced by someone else.

There are other ways to ensure such consistency. As example (which i
meant on IPF maillists) is Apache with its licensing model. You
are free to change Apache as you wish, but don't call it Apache
afterwards.

You used the same polemical points when tried to defend your read-only
license. What was the result of the whole IPF licensing, we all know --
you changed it to strange license with slogan against GPL.

Who prevents you from keeping WWW page, with URLs to your server and
approved (by you) mirrors. With words added: "these are approved
versions of my software". Sign it with GnuPG, or do something else.
And warn people about risk, if using software called like yours, but
downloaded from untrusted servers.

Licensing is not the only way. I concern license usage in such context
as primitive way.

> In essence, he's realises that the software he writes has value because of
> his name being associated with it (or it being thought of as his) and wants
> to ensure the integrity of all such packages he makes available. The only
> method he has available is to prevent any action which might put that
> integrity at risk - hence the "no modify" licence.
>
> His concern isn't about making software others can package but about writing
> secure software which others can use. A different modus operandi to what
> OpenBSD is about.
>
> The problem is when you build up a brand name and make it worth something,
> there is very little you can do to protect it, in free software, a rather
> annoying conundrum. If RedHat were to include a modified djbdns in its
> distribution, would you have the same confidence as the one from his web
> site? What if it were OpenBSD and not RedHat (and lets pretend the user
> knows who djb is but not that openbsd is cool)?
>
> It's almost like he can provide a warranty the way his stuff is currently
> distributed - something which would be null and void in any OpenBSD distro
> - and he wants it to stay that way. Who knows? Maybe someone should ask
> him and see what he says, if anything. He's an intelligent person so I'm
> sure he has good reasons to do things, we've just got to respect that.
>
> This is just my _own_ opinion and may be a load of horse shit.

This should be always applied to _any_ opinion by default. To mine as
well.

> Darren

-- 
Denis A. Doroshenko  [GPRS engineer]                   .-.        _|_  |
[Omnitel Ltd., T.Sevcenkos st. 25, Vilnius, Lithuania] | | _ _  _ .| _ |
[Phone: +370 9863486 E-mail: d.doroshenkoomnitel.net] |_|| | || |||(/_|_

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