Re: MAME emulator is giving incentive to use non-free software

[Jean Louis]

Hello Mathieu,

On Tue, Mar 29, 2016 at 04:23:15PM +0200, Mathieu Lirzin wrote:
> When talking to people contributing to a GNU project which consists of a
> FSDG compliant package manager and distribution, this is not good
> communication to suggest that “they” don't understand the true meaning
> of Free Software.  I think it would be better to just say that according
> to your interpretation of FSDG, Guix should not distribute MAME.

I agree, and I expressed only my opinions, yes.

> I have no interest in MAME, but refusing to distribute it makes
> assumption about what people are going to use it for.  The fact that
> apparently “most” people are running non-free stuff on top of it, is not
> a valid argument in term of software freedom or compliance with FSDG.
> It could be valid for other ethical issues but IMO Guix should focus
> only on Free Software ethics.

I am find if it is going to be solved by a compliance officer.

I can assume you have verified it for compliance. Please also reconsider
if than free software distribution shall include malware GPL licensed
software, because we cannot know neither assume that people are going to
use it for malware purposes, even though it is malware.

And how is MAME teaching people about free software? This section of
FSDG to me does not appear in alignment with your conclusions.

Observe also the trademark issues that I have mentioned, and compare to
Mac Os on Linux package, removed due to running only proprietary
software:

https://libreplanet.org/wiki/List_of_software_that_does_not_respect_the_Free_System_Distribution_Guidelines#Monkey.27s_Audio_Codec

and
https://savannah.nongnu.org/bugs/index.php?28332



Jean Louis