Re: [libreplanet-discuss] Fwd: The FSF Allows No Derivatives

[Aaron Wolf]

I am open to constructive criticism about tone. I care about respectful
discourse.

To be clear: I wrote:
"If you want to push this distinction, you are being intellectually
dishonest if you don't allow the very same logic and arguments to be
applied."

I did not accuse anyone of *being* intellectually dishonest, because I
did not accuse anyone of disallowing the the same logic for software and
other media. I was saying that *if* we were to go that far, it *would*
be intellectually dishonest. This was relevant because there were hints
in that direction, but I wasn't concluding that anyone actually held the
intellectually dishonest position.

I also agree that it isn't the best tone to say "completely useless
statement from Terry" But his words were: "Why not use the wasted time
and efforts spent arguing about this rewriting things your own words and
just be done with it. This horse has been beat enough and should be dead
already." In other words, he offered a rude, counter-productive approach
that appears closed-minded to concerns and effectively reads like
"whatever, shut up about this." And I didn't initially reply by
insulting his words, I just applied the same words to software to show
the inconsistent thinking. I described his words as "useless" to explain
the relationship when someone didn't understand my first point.

I think we can and should all maintain respectful discourse. I could do
better myself. But I didn't attack anyone personally, I only criticized
sloppy arguments that were written here. I *will* work to improve my
tone, but my points stand and are reasonable in and of themselves.


On 05/15/2015 03:32 PM, Yoni Rabkin wrote:
> 
>> On 05/15/2015 02:27 PM, Yoni Rabkin wrote:
>>> Aaron Wolf <wolftune@riseup.net> writes:
>>>
>>>> Why the incredible desire to use existing source code? Why not use the
>>>> wasted time and efforts spent arguing about this reverse engineering
>>>> your software and just be done with it. …
>>>
>>> Because works of personal opinion are different than useful software.
>>
>> Not different enough so that the same completely useless statement
>> from Terry couldn't be applied identically. If you want to push this
>> distinction, you are being intellectually dishonest ... And
>> complaining about the arguing is just a complete cop-out.
> 
> Calling people intellectually dishonest, telling them that their
> statements are "completely useless" and that they are "copping out"
> doesn't help anyone understand the issue better and probably just puts
> people on the defensive and hurts feelings. There really is no reason or
> justification for doing that. Please let's stop attacking people (if you
> feel attacked yourself please ask the people doing so to stop so that we
> can go back to advancing the issue.)
> 
> I don't feel like being attacked; I feel like discussing the subject. So
> I'll dropping back out of this conversion at this point. If the tone
> changes I may consider joining again.
> 

-- 
Aaron Wolf
co-founder, Snowdrift.coop
music teacher, wolftune.com