Am 21. Apr, 2001 schwäzte Derek A. Neighbors so:

> I think RMS would say there is no situation where 
> Free Software does not apply.

Which is why he's labelled as an extremist ;-).

I truely hope we someday get to that point. Tomorrow would be a great day,
in fact :). However, as my example explained, I think there are realities
that will keep us from getting there for a while. I think my warrantied
scenerio I described would be OK with him. The software could be Free
Software, but the warranty would impose certain restrictions. Since Free
Software explicitly has no warranty, the warranty pack would be something
separate and therefore not be an issue.

Unfortunately there are steps that will have to be taken before we get
there.

> > the warranty is only in effect if certain aspects of the Free Software
> > guarantees haven't been exercised. I think, however, we're going to have
> > significant difficulties getting an accounting software company to buy
> > into that. Please feel free to prove me wrong :). In such a case I would
> > still like to have source code in order to submit bug fixes, but I could
> > live without it.
> 
> In this case, I think the right answer is the IRS 
> should be providing you tax software.  It should 
> be both open and free.

I can see merits of this, but it probably won't fly with most
people. Also it doesn't give us any international interoperability. In
fact that would almost guarantee there wouldn't be interoperability of tax
packages for different countries :). I know several people who could
really use that.

ciao,

der.hans
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