Inclusion of MXit plugin into Pidgin

[Ethan Blanton]

Mark Doliner spake unto us the following wisdom:
> > If you are not, then the MXit plugin is license-incompatible with
> > Pidgin, and they must either relicense it immediately or cease
> > distribution entirely.
> 
> An additional point to consider... it may be possible for the MXit
> servers to have a terms of service that requires the user to connect
> using a client that displays ads.  My opinion is that this would be
> allowed by the GPL, but I think most of us agree that this is against
> the spirit of the license.  This is very similar to the situation with
> the Skype PRPL.

So long as the user can modify the source code to remove those ads
regardless of the TOS, it wouldn't seem to violate the GPL.
Exercising the GPL might simply violate the TOS.

That said, if this *is* in the MXit TOS, I wholly oppose inclusion of
a sanctioned, ad-bearing MXit plugin in Pidgin.  I get the impression
your example was hypothetical, though, so hopefully we don't have to
worry about that.

Ethan

-- 
The laws that forbid the carrying of arms are laws [that have no remedy
for evils].  They disarm only those who are neither inclined nor
determined to commit crimes.
		-- Cesare Beccaria, "On Crimes and Punishments", 1764
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 481 bytes
Desc: Digital signature
URL: <http://pidgin.im/pipermail/devel/attachments/20090902/f1c3cf81/attachment.sig>