As mentioned in https://github.com/fsfe/reuse-tool/issues/361 the use of GitHub for REUSE is to my understanding an obvious violation of the constitution of the Free Software Foundation Europe.
Thus i elevate the issue here to be discussed for an appropriate action taken by the FSFE or juridistical authority if sufficient action is not taken by the FSFE.
FWIW i support the use of non-free platforms to spread the awareness and reach of Free Software to ensure that the four essential rights are available to as many people as possible so i agree with Mehl's statement in https://github.com/fsfe/reuse-tool/issues/361#issuecomment-855962188, but if FSFE wants to go this way the constitution has to reflect it.
-- Jacob "Kreyren" Hrbek
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Dear Jacob and list,
Jacob Hrbek schreef op za 07-08-2021 om 13:44 [+0000]:
As mentioned in https://github.com/fsfe/reuse-tool/issues/361 the use of GitHub for REUSE is to my understanding an obvious violation of the constitution of the Free Software Foundation Europe.
Thus i elevate the issue here to be discussed for an appropriate action taken by the FSFE or juridistical authority if sufficient action is not taken by the FSFE.
Taking FSFE's mission seriously, a migration to a platform in the Free Software-friendly ecosystem would indeed look to be an appropriate step to me.
Best regards,
On Monday, 9 August 2021 12:39:37 CEST André Ockers wrote:
Jacob Hrbek schreef op za 07-08-2021 om 13:44 [+0000]:
As mentioned in https://github.com/fsfe/reuse-tool/issues/361 the use of GitHub for REUSE is to my understanding an obvious violation of the constitution of the Free Software Foundation Europe.
Thus i elevate the issue here to be discussed for an appropriate action taken by the FSFE or juridistical authority if sufficient action is not taken by the FSFE.
Taking FSFE's mission seriously, a migration to a platform in the Free Software-friendly ecosystem would indeed look to be an appropriate step to me.
And it's not as if FSFE doesn't have its own hosting platform for repositories:
But then again, here are the REUSE repositories:
Although I understand the motivation for mirroring repositories on other hosting platforms, care has to be taken not to drive people onto those platforms, making them feel obliged to sign up.
I have actually interacted with the REUSE project on GitHub because I previously had to sign up for GitHub at my employer, and since I was going to file or comment on issues, it was "convenient" to do things that way. (The hassle of setting up interaction with GitHub and similar platforms like Bitbucket means that it is never truly convenient.) But I refuse to create a personal GitHub account just to interact with projects, and when I last checked, I was not even allowed to have another account alongside my existing work account.
The FSFE actually has a reasonable foundation for empowering its supporters with infrastructure around identity and other services. When I joined the Fellowship when it was still around, we got smartcards for potential public key cryptography applications, and one could envisage more being made of such technologies to help things like secure e-mail proliferate, as well as making any services more secure and more convenient to use.
Then again, maybe I am just not up-to-date with what people are doing or are able to do with FSFE infrastructure these days, although this might also mean that opportunities are being missed to communicate with people likely to be interested in such matters.
Paul
On one if my repositories I drive a model where I push to both Github and Codeberg simultabeously (I registered both as origins push-url). That way I can take conteibutions from both places, as both repos are equitable.
Just my two cents :)
Hello,
another comment:
Am Montag 09 August 2021 12:39:37 schrieb André Ockers:
Taking FSFE's mission seriously, a migration to a platform in the Free Software-friendly ecosystem would indeed look to be an appropriate step to me.
Our mission with FSFE is to further Free Software, spread knowledge about it and its usage. When hosting the REUSE tools there is a conflict between
* We want contributions wide and spread of the tool to be very easy. Thus more people use it to mark their FS source code better. Github is (unfortunately) a leading place for people that need knowledge about how to mark Free Software files well. And who get into contributing to other people's code bases and software development at all.
* We want to promote Free Software tools (and fair platforms). Where Github is bad (Grade F in the 2015 FSF evaluation) https://www.gnu.org/software/repo-criteria-evaluation.html
So going to https://foss.heptapod.net/public would be good for the tool promotion goal, but suboptimal for the spread of REUSE. One of the goals has to give.
On a higher level: As the reuse tools mainly target people that do not know about Free Software licensing that well and its use will promote more Free Software usage (because licensing and rights ownership becomes easier), the wider spread would probably have the higher effect on the whole Free Software ecosystem than one more repository on a fair platform does for this platform. At least this is what I believe the FSFE group doing this, was considering, and it is a reasonable choice within the constitution of the FSFE in my view.
Today, using https://foss.heptapod.net/ or gitlab maybe be compromises with a different balance and maybe better. Selbsthosting maybe another, if we have enough help it maintaining the software and platform to keep it uptodate. (Savannah for instance could not keep up over the years.)
Best Regards, Bernhard