License issue, and a possible solution

[Bernhard Rosenkraenzer <bero@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi,
As a Linux distribution that uses XFree86 4.4, we've had to take quite a bit 
of heat from GPL purists about the license change.

While we don't consider the license a problem (especially w/ the widely unkown 
fact that the client side libraries aren't affected by the change), we think 
it would be good to address the problems it causes (people and distributions 
moving away from the projects, quite a few forks being started [forks can be 
a good thing -- but the ones about reinventing the wheel would better put 
their time to doing something new...], FUD being spread, etc.).

A possible solution:
Dual-License the affected parts of XFree86 under the XFree86 license 1.1 and 
the GPL.

Rationale:
1) The needs of XFree86 are still fulfilled -- if someone doesn't want to 
comply with the credit clause, they have to provide the source, which in turn 
gives credit to the project (after all, the copyright notices are all over 
it, and the tarball/zipfile/whatever will be called XFree86 so people can see 
what it is without looking at the code)
2) The needs of GPL purists are fulfilled -- they can link GPL software with 
all parts of XFree86, they can't claim anymore it's non-free, they don't need 
to start forks, ...
3) Because of 2), distributions that have switched to something else can 
return to XFree86
4) Because of 3), maybe some of the duplicated work going into XFree86, X.Org, 
XOuvert, ... can be merged back into one tree, avoiding the unneeded 
duplication.

Thanks for considering
bero
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