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I wrote to the address in the GPLv2 license notice (2022)

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Re: I wrote to the address in the GPLv2 license notice (2022)

#511

Post by Brybry »

Symbiote wrote: post #436
mvdtnz wrote: post #395

Earlier quoted context omitted.

His difficulty was finding postage stamps for the self-addressed return envelope, and clearly the author is not American. Do you think it would be quite so easy to "buy envelopes and stamps" if you had to send a stamped return envelope to Nepal or Manila? Is that a "basic life skill" or would you have to do a little research to figure out what you'd need?

He had difficulty writing an address on an envelope. This skill is something we expect of 8 year old children.

I sympathize strongly with the author. I write with a pen so infrequently (years between handwriting) that I often have handwriting errors that displease me.

So I usually do some practice writing on scratch paper before attempting the final version.

Notice he said "printing the address would have taken less time". That doesn't sound like the issue was formatting or knowledge. It reads to me as the physical skill of penmanship.

Re: I wrote to the address in the GPLv2 license notice (2022)

#512

Post by unwind »

crmi wrote: post #417
returningfory2 wrote: post #315

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand the satire, can you explain? We can't see the full set of "lower denomination" stamps on the letter, but I'm not 100% sure it's actually lower denomination. The sender of the stamps seems to be using the "2 domestic forevers + some amount of cents = 1 global forever" formula. I think the UK sender didn't need to include _two_ global forevers.

I think quoting that part alone, didn't make it clear I was referring to the whole article. >...... "Oh Well." May have been more apt. Is eBay really anyones first thought when looking for a (non-collector) stamp to (actually) mail? Perhaps he should have picked up a few £1 coins on eBay, use them to purchase some stamps from the post office?...

But, again, he was in the UK buying US stamps, so that the FSF could mail their answer back to him from the US. I don't think UK post offices supply all the world's stamps, buying that online from individuals who have them for sale makes some kind of sense, doesn't it?

I guess the a more "digital native" way would have been to first check if the USPS supports some kind of downloadable/printable stamping method, like QR codes or pre-bought labels (which, according to come early comment, they do).

Re: I wrote to the address in the GPLv2 license notice (2022)

#513

Post by db48x »

crmi wrote: post #506
xp84 wrote: post #454

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems like common courtesy for me. Given the FSF are providing that service out of altruism, and are not the ones who neglected to give OP the license in the first place, it's only appropriate to not impose upon them to go buy stamps to send an international letter.

What about the paper, ink, labour involved? Why not slip $10 into envelope instead?

De minimis. You only include the extra envelope so that you can write your own address on it. Postage is the only real expense.

Re: I wrote to the address in the GPLv2 license notice (2022)

#514

Post by Sesse__ »

mattl wrote: post #203
pabs3 wrote: post #27

The FSF has moved address at least once, and more recently, now closed their offices entirely. I wonder if the new owners of their old addresses will or did get confused by copy-of-GPL requests.

I used to work at the FSF and one of my jobs was replying to these letters. They would be so infrequent by 2008 that I think I handled less than 10 in my time there. I sent way more copies of books to prisoners who requested them, gave more tours of the office, etc. I also did some other stuff when I worked there but if you were to look at the FSF website today you might think I’m still there as pages often have the…

Debian also has a packaging lint rule telling people to update the FSF postal address. So much energy must be wasted in this. :-)

Re: I wrote to the address in the GPLv2 license notice (2022)

#515

Post by seszett »

diggan wrote: post #148
mcgrath_sh wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Genuinely curious, I don't write anything long by hand, but do you not jot down disposable information with frequency, or date food, or anything like that? I date food we put in the fridge/freezer. I jot down something like a phone number if I am redirected. I have to give my pet medication occasionally and I use a post-it to track so the household can know. Like I said, I'm not writing anything even as long as a car…

> I date food we put in the fridge/freezer What date are you putting on the food? Every packaging here in Spain (and Europe I assume) has both the production date and "best before" dates printed on them from the factory, and stuff that doesn't have packaging you know if they're bad by looking/smelling/tasting.

When freezing something you made or something unfrozen you won't be able to finish before its expiration date, it's good to write the date on it as well as what it is when it's not immediately obvious (for example... frozen duck fat and coconut oil look pretty much the same, and they don't smell anything when frozen).

Re: I wrote to the address in the GPLv2 license notice (2022)

#516

Post by desas »

globular-toast wrote: post #432
NoboruWataya wrote: post #3

Not sure if it's being exaggerated for comedic purposes but it is interesting to me how alien the act of sending a letter by post is to the author. Granted I don't send them very often but I wouldn't think much of it if I had to. But I guess younger people and particularly those in tech may genuinely never need a reason to send a letter (or, it seems, write an address by hand).

As far as I know there are still some things you have to post in the UK, like sending your cut up old driver's licence to the DVLA and maybe you still have to post your V5 when you sell a car. OP might not own a car or drive, though, so who knows?

V5Cs have been online for 3-4 years now.

You still have to send back your cut up old driver's license, though I have my doubts that someone is sat there checking and cross referencing each one they receive.

Re: I wrote to the address in the GPLv2 license notice (2022)

#517

Post by db48x »

tialaramex wrote: post #449
School-Cotton wrote: post #391

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you explain concretely why it matters in daily life that I can cut the paper posters are printed on in half several times to wind up with paper of the size that letters are printed on, and that these have the same aspect ratio? Why would I ever want to do that / why should I care that it's possible? I'm not trying to be combative; I genuinely don't know.

Not the paper, the stuff on the paper scales the same. Want a large poster and then also handbills to give out? They're identical. Got 15 full size sheets of colour information but now want to turn it into a pocket handout ? No problem, it's the same thing but smaller. This feels obvious - of course it works like that, until your paper sizes aren't using this ratio (which the US ones don't) and then the frustration i…

Here in the US we just print posters at whatever size we want. We don’t have to rely on someone to have standardized the sizes of posters. Large–format printers often go up to eight feet wide, so you can print something as big as a wall if you want (and as long as you like, because they print on a _roll_ of paper instead of a sheet). Computers have made elegant ratios irrelevant.

But if you really think it’s important, then you can consider a series of sizes like tabloid, letter, and memo to be equivalent to A3, A4, and A5. Each is exactly half the area of the previous, and can be had by dividing the larger size in half along the longer side.

Re: I wrote to the address in the GPLv2 license notice (2022)

#518

Post by db48x »

sgarland wrote: post #92
frutiger wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> if you work in tech, you must know how to fix printers, right? You kid, but it turns out the assumption was correct in this case. I suppose the truth is that by working in tech, you are likely very methodical and rely on deduction, which are both essential in fixing printer issues.

Yes, but that’s the annoying part. So many tech problems that people encounter can be trivially solved with a quick web search, poking at menus until you find something promising, or a combination thereof. I remember helping my mom over the phone to troubleshoot something on her iPhone – at the time, I had an Android, so everything was foreign to me, but I was able to deduce where a given setting might exist, and fig…

Yea, it’s like people’s brains turn off. They can read menus at restaurants, but refuse to do so when confronted with a printer or whatever.

Re: I wrote to the address in the GPLv2 license notice (2022)

#519

Post by Macha »

philwelch wrote: post #461
Macha wrote: post #451

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When I batch cook meals, I then eat them over the next few days until either it's done or it's been too long for that meal. Then I batch cook something else. I usually don't have multiple batches on the go.

So you just eat the same meal over and over again until you run out?

Pretty much. I'll have the same meal 2-3 days then cook the next.

Re: I wrote to the address in the GPLv2 license notice (2022)

#520

Post by lproven »

NoboruWataya wrote: post #3

Not sure if it's being exaggerated for comedic purposes but it is interesting to me how alien the act of sending a letter by post is to the author. Granted I don't send them very often but I wouldn't think much of it if I had to. But I guess younger people and particularly those in tech may genuinely never need a reason to send a letter (or, it seems, write an address by hand).

> it is interesting to me how alien the act of sending a letter by post is to the author.

Indeed.

The author also seems unaware that a 1991 document could not contain a Web address because the world wide web did not exist yet. They guess it is because it is not widely available. That astonished me.

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