Re: [Haskell-cafe] ANNOUNCE: tie-knot library

On Wed, Dec 12, 2012 at 2:26 AM, Ramana Kumar wrote:

Using the GPL (or a strong copyleft free license) strengthens the free software community of which I thought the Haskell community is a part (or at least intersects substantially).

I don't think it strengthens the community. If someone wants to make a change a library, but not release the source, they cannot do that with GPL. The idea behind GPL is that then, the change is forced to be released - which would, as you say, strengthen the community. However, I think what would happen instead is that the person would simply not use the library in the first place. So in short: GPL does not make people become a part of the community - it pushes them away. Jonathan