The only benefit of the perennial licensing discussion is that it demonstrates 
that Squeak continues to attract dreamers.  Unfortunately, it also burns up 
bandwidth (cheap) and enthusiasm (priceless) while accomplishing little of 
value that couldn't be better dealt with via FAQ.

Rather than opening the can of worms which could ensue in reopening the Squeak 
license, which would be likely to result in more rather than less restrictive 
provisions given recent efforts to turn IP into revenue, the best way to get 
Squeak onto desktops (not just menus) is to promote its capabilities in such 
a way that potential users feel a need for it.

To do that we need, first, to build and package readily usable and compelling 
applications (not just demonstrations) for various target markets, and then 
to make them known to those markets through articles in their publications, 
presentations at their conferences, contact on their websites and so on -- 
exactly the same as any other competitor for mindshare (and exactly what Alan 
and others leading the effort have been doing).  An educator or manager is 
far more likely to use a tool they've read about or seen, even if it takes a 
few clicks to install it, than some otherwise anonymous item on a Debian CD.

The current license is more than adequate.

Gary Fisher


On Tuesday 06 January 2004 04:08, Cees de Groot wrote:
>
> I have asked for that about a year ago and got a clear and resounding
> 'No' as an answer from Apple.
>
. . .
>
> Personally, I think that any time spent talking about the SqueakL is
> time lost. If you really want to include Squeak in Debian, for example,
> make that fetch/install script, wrap up a .deb for it, and submit it to
> Debian. I give you a 90% chance it will be accepted, and a 0.1% chance
> that you will ever get Squeak under a different license.