[Bf-committers] Can BGE be relicensed?

[Troy Sobotka]

The topic of this thread comes up at least once per year. Please use
Google as there is a vast body of information gathered from
tremendously respectable parties, including key developer opinions and
insight.

Technical hurdles are an obvious issue. Mr. Barton cites the library
issue but also the practical contribution issue:

"Heres a list of people you'd need to convince to change license
www.blender.org/development/credits"[1]

Further, there is a concern over dynamics. It is impossible to cite
the reasons that any given developer or contributor contributes, and
therefore utterly impossible to predict the influence a licensing
change may have. Again, while not specifically addressing the Blender
Player, Mr. van Lommel's quote still bears reading:

"Let's not paint this issue in black and white, LGPL for example also
means properietary software could take parts of Blender code and use
it. If Blender would have many proprietary plugins and modifications,
it does result in a different development dynamic."[2]

Finally, we have Ton, whose quote as of 2010:

"Based on feedback from key developers, the likelyhood there's a
relicense to LGPL happing is near zero. Let's focus on ways to get
end-user level useful extensions possible."[3]

Above and beyond all of this, if we cite the beginning of the thread
and the premise that must be accepted to carry this thread on, from
Mr. Hassani:

"This subject is about whether BGE can be and should be relicensed to
be more competitive as a game engine in the current environment we
find our self in."

The above thought is in fact seductive, but utterly, incomprehensibly,
and tragically a falsehood of ideology.

There is no need to "be more competitive" in a Libre / open source
project. Full stop. To contest this statement would require contesting
Blender's existence and evolution itself.

The evidence is overwhelming.

With respect, and with the dearest hope that this thread ends as it
does every year,
TJS

[1] http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.video.blender.devel/28386
[2] http://www.mail-archive.com/bf-committers@blender.org/msg04384.html
[3] http://www.mail-archive.com/bf-committers@blender.org/msg04379.html