suggestion how to describe the need of a Free Software license

[schiessle]

@hugoroy suggested that I provide my suggestion as a pull request, so here it is.

Basically it adds a short description why it is important that the software behind the service is Free Software.

[hugoroy]

It is unclear what “the programs” is referring to.

[schiessle]

I have chosen to call it "the programs" because that's also how it is called directly above the lines I changed, but maybe it can be improved.

For reference: https://github.com/userdatamanifesto/www/pull/13/files#diff-7346093615dafd9d494cba541fc864f0R120

[hugoroy]

Yes, we need to improve that.

The aim of that provision is that even if you use a somewhat closed service, you should be able to get your data out and put it in a service relying on free software. So there should be free software available already to process the data that you get out, otherwise this is too impractical.

[schiessle]

Should there be some program which can process the data or should the same program be available as Free Software? That's a big difference. If we say that there should be only some program then it can become quite blurry. E.g. is it enough if the other program can only read/write the date even if the original platform did much more? It is not that easy to define when a program meets all requirements to be a replacement. That's why I would say that the service from which you extract your data need to be Free Software.

[hugoroy]

If service providers were already all giving access to the source code of their software, most of the issues we face would not appear.

A service providing its software source code under a free software license will always be better than another service provider that doesn't.

But from the point of view of extracting your data, maybe it is not wise to make a requirement for getting the software too. However, it is paramount that the data you get out can be processed with free software. In theory, this is already possible if the data is in a format that's an Open Standard. Which is why I'm enclined to make open standard a requirement, a free software a very nice addition but not a requirement, only something nice for extra convenience (which is what I had in mind when I badly drafted that part). cc @karlitschek @jancborchardt

[schiessle]

Also to make this sentence true in practice it is required that the service runs on Free Software:

" Users should not rely on centralised services. Peer-to-peer systems and unhosted applications are a means to that end. In the long term, all users should be able to have their own server."

how else should everybody be able to run his own server and do the same stuff he did with the service he used before? The only solution I see is (1) the service is Free Software so that I can set up my own instance or (2) there exists a mostly 1:1 clone as Free Software. But just a program that can do something with the data will be not enough in most cases.

[hugoroy]

Let's add: “their own server with Free Software.”

[schiessle]

Let's add: “their own server with Free Software.”

added.

I re-read the other paragraph:

"Open Standards for formats and protocols are necessary to guarantee this. Obviously, without the source code of the programs used to deal with user data, this is impractical. In order to enable the user to process the user data on the platform of his choice the programs should be available under a Free Software license like the GNU AGPL-3"

I think the second sentence describes "programs" quite well as "the programs used to deal with user data". We could repeat it in sentence three but I don't think that this is necessary. Or the third sentence doesn't talk about "the programs" but about "these programs" to make it more obvious to refer to the definition of sentence two:

"Open Standards for formats and protocols are necessary to guarantee this. Obviously, without the source code of the programs used to deal with user data, this is impractical. In order to enable the user to process the user data on the platform of his choice these programs should be available under a Free Software license like the GNU AGPL-3"

Opinions?

[jancborchardt]

Please use gender-neutral language here. It should be »platform of their choice« instead of »his«.

[schiessle]

good catch... updated