Re: [Fsfe-uk] Wikipedia to merge Free Software and Open Source

[Ian Lynch]

On Tue, 2008-04-08 at 18:27 +0100, Alex Hudson wrote:
> Noah Slater wrote:
> > You could develop some software in total secrecy and occasionally publish 
> > the
> > code with a GPL licence. This would be Free Software but to call it Open 
> > Source
> > would be a mistake because it does not follow an open development 
> > methodology.
> >   
> 
> Netscape was "open source" the moment they released the code; that was 
> like the first the big open source win.
> 
> The development methodology is an adjunct. I agree that the open source 
> attitude, if there is one, is that "it's better to develop code in large 
> groups", and to do that you need a suitable licensing environment. But 
> whether or not something is "open source" is nothing to do with how it's 
> developed.

And you could have open source code but a restrictive license for using
it.

Ian
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