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"The problem is, it's decidedly less open and free for authors who prefer a more permissive license."

GPL-licensed software is Free software that stays Free. BSD software can become closed any time, something GPL software cannot. If you contribute to a BSD'ed project you take the risk of your competitor taking your code and making it a competitive advantage against you.

We may say GPL'ed software is "imprisonment resistant".

As for taking in Lamson code into Django, all that's needed is a GPL'ed fork of Django that can follow trunk very closely. GPL'ing Django is, in fact, turning that "imprisonment" mechanism on its head.

Any such code, of course, would have to be kept out of Ellington, for instance.

edit: second part of second paragraph was wrong



Oh, yeah, I forgot something in my other response.

> If you contribute to a BSD'ed project you take the risk of your competitor taking your code and making it a competitive advantage against you.

The GPL actually has more value as a tool of anticompetitive advantage than the BSD License:

http://sob.apotheon.org/?p=622


BSD code used in proprietary software is not "imprisoned" -- the original work remains free no matter how someone uses it.


> GPLed software is Free™ software that remains Free™.

FTFY




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