RE: Draft Consitution

[david.buddrige@mitswa.com.au]

Unsure what you guys in melbourne are doing, however in Perth we decided to
keep any reference as to _how_ we acheive the goals of computerbank fairly
much out of the constitution, and kept this sort of thing to the discretion
of the implementors.  Our reasoning for doing it this way, is to maximise
the flexibility we have in acheiving our aims.  I would _not_ want to put a
statement saying "thou shalt use OSS" for the following reasons:

1. The constitution is a legally binding document.  It is perfectly possible
to sue someone for a breach of the constitution within computerbank.  What
if you want to put StarOffice on your systems? requiring OSS requires you to
forget about ever using StarOffice, Applixware or any other such product
during the course acheiving the aims of Computerbank. There may be a host of
circumstances where you wish to use proprietary software (I know, it's
politically bad stuff but eralistically, you don't want to forbit yourself
from using it) What if you want to put some shareware program (later on down
the road) onto the systems? etc....

2. If you _really_ want it mentioned, put it in the bylaws where you can
remove it with a low-amount-of-fuss if it becomes an issue. (If you want to
change the constitution, you'll have to reapply to the government, re-pay
the fees, etc, etc... it's a real pain.

Sorry if I've misunderstood what was being proposed... I think it's  areally
bad Idea to put a statement about _how_ we acheive our aims in the
constitution - it's far too inflexible a doco to cater for that well....

cheers

David Buddrige... 8-)

> -----Original Message-----
> From:	Kylie Davies [SMTP:beckster@warehouse.net]
> Sent:	Tuesday, February 23, 1999 8:31 PM
> To:	computerbank@linux.org.au
> Subject:	Re: Draft Consitution
> 
> > 
> > What does everyone think? seems like a good idea to me - for non-profit
> > groups only?
> > 
> 
> Sounds okay to me - 
> 
> > 
> > I also wantr to put in something in the Statement of Purpose clause
> > (early on) about "free software", to replace or give teeth to the open
> > source bit; I've read through the GNU site, and hope someone has a
> > "sound bite" length definition of free software... Help!
> 
> the latest article by Richard Stallman at
> http://www.fsf.org/gnu/thegnuproject.html
> might provide some useful pointers. eg:
> 
> > Free as in freedom
> > 
> > The term "free software" is sometimes misunderstood--it has nothing to
> do with price. It is about
> > freedom. Here, therefore, is the definition of free software: a program
> is free software, for you,
> > a particular user, if: 
> > 
> >     You have the freedom to run the program, for any purpose. 
> >     You have the freedom to modify the program to suit your needs. (To
> make this freedom
> >     effective in practice, you must have access to the source code,
> since making changes in a
> >     program without having the source code is exceedingly difficult.) 
> >     You have the freedom to redistribute copies, either gratis or for a
> fee. 
> >     You have the freedom to distribute modified versions of the program,
> so that the
> >     community can benefit from your improvements. 
> 
> Quoted from Stallman's article
> 
> kylie