[rescue] Re: Being jobless

[Frank Van Damme]

On Thursday 31 July 2003 06:17, vance at neurotica.com wrote:
> Just because the GNU toolset is GPL doesn't mean the GNU toolset wouldn't
> exist without GPL.  Where is that proven?

Because the system itself was an afterthought. What mattered to rms in the
eighties was to have a free operating system, not an operating system that
had a good toolset or compiler that was coincidentally released under a free
license.

So yes, maybe someone would have written a closed-source freeware unix clone.
It don't think it would have become half as popular as GNU. Free software is,
indeed, viral ;-) - much of the success of GNU comes from the fact that
everyone can contribute to it, so the system gets better. I don't think my
imaginary freeware unix clone would get the developper input GNU has had.

That said, no, the license could have been slightly different. But the GNU
toolset wouldn't exist without some sort of free software license.

--
Frank Van Damme    http://www.openstandaarden.be
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"Je pense, donc je suis breveti."