Hi. Sorry for replying to an older thread, but I've only just subscribed. On Friday, 20 July 2007 at 20:05, Toshio Kuratomi wrote: > On Fri, 2007-07-20 at 10:25 -0400, Elliot Lee wrote: > > >From what I can gather, here's what's important: > > 1. Promoting software freedom. > > 2. Making life easier for the users who want to play media files. > > > > It seems to me like goal #1 requires that the default install and > > official Fedora links not point users at software that is not really > > free. Simple as that. > > > Depending on your definition of free... > -1) Non-libre, non-gratis, software. > 0) Non-patent-encumbered, non-free software but free-as-in-beer software > 1) Patent-encumbered-in-the-US free software. > 2) Patent-encumbered-in-the-US non-free software that has a license > granting use of the patent. > 3) Patent-encumbered-in-the-US free software with the patent licensed > for use of a binary build of the software. > > #-1 is not in any repo I'm aware of us thinking of linking to but it > could exist in a repository we don't control. > #0 is not mentioned in this thread but is a part of third party repos we > may be contemplating linking to. > #1 includes mplayer, xine w/DVD support, etc. > #2 includes the Fluendo WMV codec plugin for gstreamer. > #3 includes the Fluendo mp3 codec plugin for gstreamer. > > If there were no legal issues, I'd like Fedora to be able to distribute, > automatically install, point to, or otherwise make as easy as possible > for users to get #1 and #3. So the open-ended question posed to legal > would be: how can we help end-users get #1 and #3. #0 and #2 are > proprietary software and are philosophically against the Fedora mission > of providing a complete OS built on free software. > > I think this is the basis of Max's original question of larger strategy. > Does the Board and the people who make up the Project *desire* to make > end-user's lives better WRT patent-encumbered free software or do we > lump patent-encumbered free software in the same category as non-free? > > So my personal open-ended question for legal would be: How can we help > users get #1 and #3? > > Targeted questions would be: > * Can we point users at a repository we don't control that has #1, #3, > and possibly things less legal (Since we don't control it)? > * Can we point users to a specific package of #1 or #3 in another > repository? > * Can we download and attempt to install the package for the user in > either of the above cases? Why were there no replies here? As MPlayer developer and Livna contributor I'm very much interested in answers to the above questions. Regards, R. -- Fedora contributor http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/DominikMierzejewski Livna contributor http://rpm.livna.org MPlayer developer http://mplayerhq.hu "Faith manages." -- Delenn to Lennier in Babylon 5:"Confessions and Lamentations" _______________________________________________ fedora-advisory-board mailing list fedora-advisory-board@xxxxxxxxxx http://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-advisory-board
