> Is there another reading of "If they had to use" that I'm not aware of?
Well, yes.
You started your argument with "If BSD wasn't available they'd be using QNX".
So I followed on from that with "If they had to use QNX... If they had to use GPL..."
I was just following the logical outcome of your "If BSD wasn't available" argument, not advocating that BSD must not be available.
> I'm a user and a developer and neither of those descriptions seem to apply to the licenses being discussed.
I don't know how you can think that "pro-user" doesn't apply to the GPL - it's the singular goal of the GPL to protect user freedoms. This has never been ambiguous.
GPL == freedom for the user. It's always been this way. This is nothing new. You cannot, with a straight face and at this point in the conversation, claim that you didn't know the goal of the GPL.
As far as the pro-corporate aspect of BSD, that's pretty clear to me, because of how extensively corporations were able to mine BSD code for shareholder benefit.
So, yeah, with BSD, you might argue differently (for example, argue that corporate mining of BSD code is a side-effect), but there is no way to argue that GPL isn't pro-user.
> GPL == freedom for the user. It's always been this way. This is nothing new. You cannot, with a straight face and at this point in the conversation, claim that you didn't know the goal of the GPL
Your words. My words indicate that I see both licenses and being pro-everyone.
> As far as the pro-corporate aspect of BSD, that's pretty clear to me, because of how extensively corporations were able to mine BSD code for shareholder benefit.
Mining is an ecologically destructive activity which bears no resemblance to using software under the terms which it was licensed.
Well, yes.
You started your argument with "If BSD wasn't available they'd be using QNX".
So I followed on from that with "If they had to use QNX... If they had to use GPL..."
I was just following the logical outcome of your "If BSD wasn't available" argument, not advocating that BSD must not be available.
> I'm a user and a developer and neither of those descriptions seem to apply to the licenses being discussed.
I don't know how you can think that "pro-user" doesn't apply to the GPL - it's the singular goal of the GPL to protect user freedoms. This has never been ambiguous.
GPL == freedom for the user. It's always been this way. This is nothing new. You cannot, with a straight face and at this point in the conversation, claim that you didn't know the goal of the GPL.
As far as the pro-corporate aspect of BSD, that's pretty clear to me, because of how extensively corporations were able to mine BSD code for shareholder benefit.
So, yeah, with BSD, you might argue differently (for example, argue that corporate mining of BSD code is a side-effect), but there is no way to argue that GPL isn't pro-user.