[MacPerl] Re: Licenses

[Vicki Brown <vlb@cfcl.com>]

At 19:19 -0400 98/07/21, Chris Nandor wrote:
> Do Mac users have something against something like the Artistic License or
> the GNU GPL?  It seems to me that more MacPerl code (per capita :) is
> under alternate licenses than is Perl code in general.

I think the simple answer is "yes" :-)
A more complex answer is "no, it only seems that way".

That is, the Mac is not, traditionally, a programmer's system (Unix is).
The idea of freely redistributable source code is very foreign to the Mac
community in general.  There is some "freeware" but "freeware" in the Mac
community often means "I am absolved of all responsibility; I don't want
any money; it's yours; do as you want with it".  Not that there is much to
do without being able to rebuild the whateveritis.

I don't think it's so much that Mac-based code writers have a problem with
either the Artistic License or the Gnu license.  Just that they are less
likely to have been exposed to either.

Even in the Unix "freeware" community, as you get farther from the
Linux/Perl/Gnu camps, you see some weird stuff.  (Try to do a Unix
"freeware" compendium sometime.".  Like:
    You can put it up for ftp but not on a CD-ROM (telnet :-)
    You can give it away and you can redistribute it but you can't charge
        money for it (or for the disk, or...)
    You can put it on a floppy but not on a CD
    You can give it away or put it into a collection but you must NEVER
        change anything about it (one of my "favorites")
    You can redistribute with my permission (no address, email or
        otherwise, included of course)
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