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RFC: criteria A4 should be a C-class criteria


From: bill-auger
Subject: RFC: criteria A4 should be a C-class criteria
Date: Thu, 11 Mar 2021 22:41:32 -0500

i suggest that the 'A' classification of A4 is inconsistent with
the stated goal of this project

> A4 - Does not permit nonfree licenses (or lack of license) for
>      works for practical use.

all of the web forges that i know of, freely offer VCS clones
and source-ball downloads of every public repo, regardless of
it's license (or lack thereof) - i am not aware of any web forge
which allows the repo maintainer to disallow downloads of
unlicensed works - given that, any local copies taken of any
parts of an unlicensed work, would be a blatant copyright
violation; surely, this (anti-)feature fails any test of "ethics"

secondly, consider the 'C' class description:

> C — Acceptable hosting for a GNU package

surely, a "nonfree licenses (or lack of license)" is not
acceptable for a GNU package; which already implies that A4
is a class 'C' criteria

i propose that A4 is moved to the median level ('C') of
"ethical repository criteria"

furthermore, AFAIK, all web forges support hosting repos with
private-only/invitation-only access; so i also propose qualifying
the criteria, to pertain only to publicly distributed works - it
should be acceptable, for anyone who wants to store WIP code on
one of these forges, but without choosing a license, to host it
with private or invite-only access, before deciding on a license
- so, A4 should not be presented as an optional bonus feature -
it is not an unreasonable expectation, as a fundamental criteria
WRT public distribution - eg:

> A4 - (deleted)
>
> C7 - Permits public distribution of works for practical use,
>      only if they are freely-licensed.

the initial result of 'C7', would be that all forges currently
listed and under evaluation, except for savannah, would fail
to meet the 'C' level criteria; because AFAIK, savannah is the
only forge in existence, which meets the A4 criteria, even in
it's current form

it appears that A4 was put at the 'A' level originally, only such
that it allowed _any_ forge other than savannah, to be deemed as
acceptable - there are many more public forges in operation now,
than there were when this project was started, which are on-par
with, or exceed gitlab's original ranking; and many
full-featured libre self-hosting options are available - i think
that there is ample justification for dispensing with such
concessions now; and categorize any forge which offers
unauthorized copies of unlicensed works, as unacceptable
"ethically"



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