Hi,

Il giorno mer 27 nov 2019 alle ore 21:48 Arne Babenhauserheide <arne_bab@web.de> ha scritto:

Jesse Gibbons <jgibbons2357@gmail.com> writes:
> On Wed, 2019-11-27 at 00:26 +0100, Nicolò Balzarotti wrote:
> I can confirm that snes9x is nonfree because it is only for non-commercial
> use. We should at least patch that out before the cores are available. I
> don't know about the other one.

Aren’t we overblocking here? This is not a case of a program restricted
to push someone into proprietary software, but a case of a program
restricted to not-for-profit for everybody.
This is, by (some) definition, non free.


It is a similar case as allowing to ship GPLv3 software in a ROM without
the option to modify it, as long as no one is able to modify it on that
medium, including the propagator.

In the case of snes9x no one is able to monetize the software, including
the creators, because many people have a stake in the non-commercial
clause, but the software is freely modifiable and you can share it
non-commercially.

It is also not advertised (I just tried) but simply one in a long list
of possible cores. A very long list. And you have to actively do the
online-lookup.

We’re not restricting software which displays non-free online comics
either.
Comics aren't software. Free as in Freedom can apply only to software, AFAIK


Installing the fastest and most compatible free software cores by
default (pre-installed) would minimize the effect of cores bound to
non-commercial use being available online without restricting the users
in using RetroArch — and it would make retroarch more convenient to use.
 
If I understand correctly (i.e. shipping free cores with our retroarch distribution, while still allowing non-free software download from the software), I half-way agree with you. However, IMO, we should not encourage the use of non free software, at all. Those non-free cores available in one click, and a user might not even know that 1. s/he is downloading some kind of software and 2. that this software is non-free (no license details). I was upset in discovering that I downloaded a non-free core, and I realized just because of the ".so.zip" name. If upstream they change the name to "core.zip", future users might not even understand what they are doing. Also, it might even happen that they will share non-opensource plugins in the future. I don't know and I don't think it is fair.
Finally, in a purely reproducible interest, having random software downloaded is just bad.

Let me know what do you think,
Nicolò

Best wishes,
Arne
--
Unpolitisch sein
heißt politisch sein
ohne es zu merken