Re: rewriting history; Was: Concerns/questions around Software Heritage Archive

[Andreas Enge <andreas@enge.fr>]

Am Mon, Mar 18, 2024 at 04:03:20PM +0200 schrieb MSavoritias:
> Rewriting history is the wrong question imo. I dont think a request to
> change all of the history of Guix will be accepted anyway.
> A much easier thing to do is to change the approach in the future. And let
> all the past history untouched.

I was well thinking about the future history as well as the past one...
Everything we do now becomes unmutable history in the future; so the
question how we can rewrite an a priori unmutable history remains the same,
regardless of the date when person X wants to be known as person Y: Also in
the future, someone may wish to travel to a time before the change.
And the fundamental problem of history rewriting remains; I do not see
how we could simplify it. So I do not think that it is "a much easier
thing to do". Please feel free to prove me wrong by making a concrete
suggestion!

Am Mon, Mar 18, 2024 at 04:00:38PM +0200 schrieb MSavoritias:
> On 3/18/24 15:12, Simon Tournier wrote:
> > Again, this is an incorrect frame, IMHO.  Software Heritage (SWH) do the
> > things you granted them to do.  SWH respects the “ethical” definition of
> > “free software”.
> You are bringing the legal argument again. The argument that you can do what
> you want with Free Software is based around a licence which is a legal
> construct of states.

I think there is a misunderstanding here, rooted in the use of "you" in
"you can do what you want". We need to be clear about whom we are speaking.
There is SWH, and what they can do is a result of the free license. The
other question is what we as the Guix community want to do (and can do);
I would suggest to concentrate in our discussion on the latter, which is
where we have agency.

Andreas