MPL 1.1 Incompatibility
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https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html#MPL
According to this page, MPL 1.1 is not GPL compatible because it has "some complex restrictions." This also makes it non-FSF approved, so I am not sure if it should be considered morally right to promote it on Trisquel. Some of the add-ons issued in the Abrowser Add-on list are licensed under MPL 1.1, such as PDF Downloader. However, I'm not sure whether this was on accident or not as I'm not exactly sure what qualifies for the Add-on list.
> This also makes it non-FSF approved
That is not correct. Even a license that is not compatible with the GPL can still be a free software license. If you'll notice, the MPL is in the section called "GPL-Incompatible ***Free Software Licenses***"
Being a free software license, things using the MPL 1.1 can then be included in Trisquel because all free licenses, whether GPL compatible or not, satisfy the criteria in http://www.gnu.org/distros/free-system-distribution-guidelines.html
"We urge you not to use the MPL 1.1 for this reason."
Just because it's a bad license to use doesn't mean it's unethical or non-free. The MPL 1.1 and all licenses under https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html#GPLIncompatibleLicenses are ethical; GPL-incompatibility is a practical problem, not an ethical problem.
Of course, some of these licenses (like the Netscape licenses) have ethical problems too, but none of them have enough of ethical problems to make them non-free, and so there is no reason not to use programs already under them.
>Of course, some of these licenses (like the Netscape licenses) have ethical problems too
Aren't ethics the whole point of using FOSS in the first place?
Yeah... which is why it's OK to use software under a license that's ethical even if it has practical problems.
I might understand, for example, avoiding software under the Netscape licenses because the copyleft not applying to a particular organization is too unethical for you. (It isn't for me; what's the real difference between that and everyone being allowed to make proprietary versions? It's just that one proprietary software developer has an advantage over other proprietary software developers.) But this topic is about the MPL 1.1, right? That license doesn't have any sort of ethical problems, unless you think being weak copyleft is unethical somehow (which would extend to all permissive licenses being unethical, making X unethical).
That doesn't mean the license itself is not ethical. All free software licenses are. The version of the BSD license with the advertising clause is free, but not GPL compatible because of the advertising clause. That doesn't mean you don't have all four freedoms. Strong copyleft licenses always cause this problem. If you want to make a system that had no license compatibility issues, good luck with that. You'd have to remove, for example, openssl because it's not under a GPL compatible license, even though it's still free software. You'd also have to remove the kernel called Linux because it's not compatible with GPLv3. Good luck having a working system without a kernel.
So... GPL-incompatible is not non-free nor does GPL-incompatible mean less free.
That's the first thing to get into your head.
On 18/10/13 13:03, oralfloss wrote:
> https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html#MPL
>
> According to this page, MPL 1.1 is not GPL compatible because it has
> "some complex restrictions." This also makes it non-FSF approved,
No it doesn't?
Andrew.
On top of that, using a GPL compatible license would be important and even better. I guess many people who are using MPL 1.1 could be made to transition to MPL 2.0 which is GPL compatible.
Version 2.0 of the MPL is the future of the license and 1.1 licensed software can be migrated to version 2.0, which is GPL compatible. Maybe you can email the authors to make the change?
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