On Wed, 1 Sep 93 23:45:14 MET DST, "Peter Eriksson" <pen@SIGNUM.SE> wrote:
> I figure Signum can't be the first company having to fight
> some peoples dislike for GPL:ing/LGPL:ing software?
> 
> We're right now discussing a project with a potential customer
> where we want to make parts of the project LGPL'd. The boss of
> that company says (approximately) in reply to my proposal:
> 
>    "Hmm.. that'll mean that we'll be providing our direct business
>     competitors with source, but they'll never in hell provide anything
>     similar back to us. Do you think that is correct?"
> 
> Do you have any good responses to this type of argumentation?

Not really.  He's probably correct.  However, customers appreciate
non-profitable things that are done by companies.  Maybe this is one
of them?

> (He later in his letter seems to accept to make the library LGPL'd,
> but I'd rather have him happy and fully accept that we make the
> library LGPL'd, than having him accept the LGPL but be sour...)

Hmmm...  The LGPL is a compromise on the GPL, a concession to users
of LGPL code and a detraction to contributors of LGPL code.

To my mind, the only reason to use the LGPL is if you 1) have a piece
of code you don't care to exploit commercially, or 2) just want to do
it for philosophical reasons.

-- 
-russ <nelson@crynwr.com> What canst *thou* say?
Crynwr Software           Crynwr Software sells packet driver support.
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