> In strictly philisophical (and possibly some legal) terms I don't
> think one can consider software that can be "hijacked" and turned
> into proprietary software to be truely "open" and free.

I don't know about the legal sense.  But as for the other, I don't see
how it can be otherwise.  "We're going to make this software free by
imposing restrictions on what you can do with it".  Excuse me?  Run
that by me again?

I've been placing most of my stuff in the public domain.  Anyone can
take it and redistribute it under any terms desired, including
forbidding further redistribution without special agreement.  What
*nobody*, not even me, can do is restrict what anyone does with a copy
obtained independently.  (At least in jurisdictions with a notion of
"public domain" at least roughly equivalent to the North American one.)

This despite exactly that having happened to me at least once,
something I put a nontrivial amount of effort into being picked up and
used as the base for a commercial product I never saw a dime from.

					der Mouse

			       mouse@rodents.montreal.qc.ca
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