Re: MAME emulator is giving incentive to use non-free software

[Jean Louis <guix@rcdrun.com>]

For further thinkering, for those people who shoule be deciding what
software shall be included in free software distribution and what not,
here are some arguments:

Guidelines, read them well, especially sections such as "Nonfree
Firmware", then section "Trademarks", and "Please Teach Users about Free
Software": 
http://www.gnu.org/distros/free-system-distribution-guidelines.html

List of software that does not respect the Free System Distribution
Guidelines (this is work in progress):
https://libreplanet.org/wiki/List_of_software_that_does_not_respect_the_Free_System_Distribution_Guidelines

What is going on at Trisquel:
https://trisquel.info/en/wiki/software-does-not-respect-free-system-distribution-guidelines

At the Trisquel link, one can see "Mac-on-Linux emulator":
Description: Allows running MacOS inside a GNU/Linux system,
Problem: Only runs/supports proprietary software
Recommended Fix: Remove program/package
(Source) package name(s): mol, mol-drivers-linux
Trisquel Status: Fixed (removed upstream)

Compare the above to MAME issue, as it is similar.

Now is the time to think. It will be late in 3-5 years to correct
mistakes:

- decision to include MAME in a free GNU distribution directly
  influences users to use non-free software and promotes non-free
  software 

- the argument "let us search for one free software ROM" to justify the
  inclusion of MAME in such free distribution is one-sided, and does not
  foresee the future results. As MAME is made exclusively with the
  purpose to support non-free software, the practical future result is
  that people will be guided to download and use non-free ROMs,

- free software distribution shall not offer a platform for conservancy
  of non-free software for future,

- it can be clearly seen that website of MAME: http://mamedev.org/
  offers under Download section, non-free ROMs:
  http://mamedev.org/roms/ (disregard their definiton of "free" as they
  are not)

- why would free software distribution support and include software that
  was primarily made for usage of non-free software?! Single fact that
  such software is free does not demand and promote usage of free
  software. See Guidelines.

- MAME® is a U.S. registered trademark, that may be found with the
  USPTO:
  http://tmsearch.uspto.gov/bin/gate.exe?f=login&p_lang=english&p_d=trmk
  by searching for: MAME, serial number: 78578919, where it says:

  Goods and Services      IC 009. US 021 023 026 036 038. G & S:
  Downloadable computer software that enables the emulation of arcade
  games and their associated hardware, allowing them to run on a general
  purpose computer operating system. FIRST USE: 19981100. FIRST USE IN
  COMMERCE: 19981100

  Owner     (REGISTRANT) Salmoria, Nicola

  And the owner, clearly says on the website: http://mamedev.org/
  "Please note that MAME is a registered trademark of Nicola Salmoria,
  and permission is required to use the "MAME" name, logo or wordmark. "
  which makes the whole software package under that name (MAME®) non-free and
  incompatible with GPL 2.0 -- for example, I cannot sell MAME package
  that I would get from GuixSD, as I would be required special
  permission to use MAME® trademark.

- or Nicola Salmoria could make to the distribution something like what
  KIK INTERACTIVE INC. did to kik package with the NPM:
  https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11341491 and trademark issues are
  the exact reason why some other packages are not included or have been
  forked

- using MAME is endorsement for the use of non-free ROMs, even if there
  would be 1-2 free ROMs, people would come to MAME website and download
  non-free ROMs.

Regarding Wine:

- Wine website is constantly endorsing non-free software, what is easy
  to see from their News: https://www.winehq.org/announce/1.9.6 as they
  develop the software to run non-free software, I guess mostly for
  gamers, who don't care about free software philosophy.

- for that same reason I would reject Wine in ALL free software
  distributions.

- single fact that some piece of software is free software, shall not be
  the only factor to consider inclusion of software in free software
  distribution.

- Wine is not "freedom respecting" software (see guidelines), and as
  such, does not demand, rather it encourages users to use non-free
  software.

- few exceptional cases may exceptionally download it and run for their
  exceptional uses in the non-free world, without inclusion of Wine in
  the free software distribution.

All written above are my opinion, and not legal advices.

Jean Louis