From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: taylanbayirli@gmail.com (Taylan Ulrich =?utf-8?Q?Bay=C4=B1rl=C4=B1?= =?utf-8?Q?=2FKammer?=) Subject: Re: MAME emulator is giving incentive to use non-free software Date: Tue, 29 Mar 2016 10:58:26 +0200 Message-ID: <877fglzmml.fsf@T420.taylan> References: <20160328215516.GA27719@protected.rcdrun.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Return-path: Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([2001:4830:134:3::10]:38184) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1akpTq-0004up-7G for guix-devel@gnu.org; Tue, 29 Mar 2016 04:58:31 -0400 Received: from Debian-exim by eggs.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1akpTp-0001Bb-B2 for guix-devel@gnu.org; Tue, 29 Mar 2016 04:58:30 -0400 Received: from mail-wm0-x231.google.com ([2a00:1450:400c:c09::231]:33635) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1akpTp-0001BQ-47 for guix-devel@gnu.org; Tue, 29 Mar 2016 04:58:29 -0400 Received: by mail-wm0-x231.google.com with SMTP id r72so47368245wmg.0 for ; Tue, 29 Mar 2016 01:58:28 -0700 (PDT) In-Reply-To: <20160328215516.GA27719@protected.rcdrun.com> (Jean Louis's message of "Mon, 28 Mar 2016 23:55:16 +0200") List-Id: "Development of GNU Guix and the GNU System distribution." List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Errors-To: guix-devel-bounces+gcggd-guix-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Sender: guix-devel-bounces+gcggd-guix-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org To: Jean Louis Cc: guix-devel@gnu.org Jean Louis writes: > [...] > > Including MAME or any other emulator, even though non-free as such, if > such emulator is practically of no use to free software users without > non-free additions or parts, firmware, blobs, or ROMs, is giving > incentive to free software users to use non-free. > > [...] For the record, we have a couple Nintendo emulators in games.scm. In particular I packaged Nestopia and Mupen64Plus a while back, and was planning to add higan once I have a solution to its license issue... These would have to go as well I suppose, if MAME will have to go. They're clearly for playing non-free games, at least as far as I'm concerned. I don't have a strong opinion on the outcome of this. Gaming is one thing where I personally tolerate non-free software out of a lack of meaningful alternatives. (The artistic value of a well-made video game cannot be duplicated, in contrast to its technical features as software, which can be re-implemented.) Having such emulators in the main package repository is convenient for people like me, but I can't demand for this to be supported by the project. By the way, I'm no parenting expert, but I know that if I tried to prohibit my child siblings from using their smartphones, tablets, MS=C2=A0Windows laptops, and PlayStation, for playing non-free games and using non-free software based services like YouTube, it would seem like a stupid limitation to them "because everyone else does it" and they would just go to their friends to do these things anyway. It would just not work. Taylan