Subject:
Re: [discuss] licence problems
From:
Rick Moen ####@####.####
Date:
3 Oct 2008 22:10:27 +0100
Message-Id: <20081003211023.GD1041@linuxmafia.com>
Quoting David Lawyer ####@####.####
> On Thu, Sep 25, 2008 at 02:58:10PM -0700, Rick Moen wrote:
> > Quoting Jean-Daniel Dodin ####@####.####
> >
> > > well, we can't discuss if you repeatedly challenge the other intelligence.
> >
> > I am certainly not impugning anyone's intelligence: All of this stuff
> > is non-obvious, and nobody's born with understanding of it. ;->
> >
> >
> > > we may have problems to understand each others, but this licencing
> > > problem is not that easy, that's why I keep discussing.
> > >
> > > the problem is that GPL ask derivative works to have the very same
> > > licence.
> >
> > I'm not sure I see the relevance, but: No, that is not the case.
> But GPL does require the derivative work to have the same license.
> But see what I say later on.
No, you're making the same mistake that some of the BSD fundamentalists
are making, in their passionate cries for addition of new, anti-copyleft
defensive licensing terms and legal strategies to the codebases
maintained by BSD people. GPL _cannot_ make that requirement of people
who create derivative works, and it does not do so.
Now, yes, I _am_ (minutely, exhaustively, ad nauseam) familiar with the
wording of GPLv2 clause 2b:
You must cause any work that you distribute or publish, that in
whole or in part contains or is derived from the Program or any
part thereof, to be licensed as a whole at no charge to all third
parties under the terms of this License.
In the real world, that means that the derivative work must be usable
under terms no more restrictive on the user than GPL ones. You can
incorporate a new-BSD module into a GPLv2 work without licence conflict
and without acquiring the new-BSD module author's assent to relicensing
his property under copyleft terms _because_ new-BSD user obligations are
a proper subset of GPLv2 ones, and new-BSD user rights are a proper
superset of GPLv2 ones.
The downstream user automatically satisfies new-BSD obligations if and
when he/she satisfies GPLv2 ones. It is absolutely unnecessary to
wrestle out of the new-BSD copyright holder a new grant of permission
under GPLv2 -- which is what your view would dictate.
If your view were correct, then every new-BSD-licensed codebase author
in the world, whose code was ever borrowed for a GPLv2 work, would have
reason to be enraged at the copyleft world over the "involuntary GPL
relicensing" of his/her work that was done without his/her permission.
No, that is _not_ what happens. The GPL author is _not_ relicensing
the BSD guy's code. The incorporation is possible because recipients
can satisfy the derivative's obligations by meeting GPLv2 terms, as
those automatically satisfy the obligations enumerated in new-BSD.
If your view were correct, I could be sued for copyright violation in
the following hypothetical:
Alice creates work foo under GPLv2, and finds it convenient to incorporate
Bob's new-BSD-licensed library bar. Later, I come along, find the copy
of bar that's packaged with foo convenient, and borrow _that_ "bar"
instance for a proprietary work of my own. Alice hears that I've done
so, and writes to me: "Rick, did you use the instance of 'bar' that was
bundled into my work 'foo'?" I reply "Yes, thank you for calling my
attention to that library. It was very useful." She writes back,
alleging that my proprietary work is subject to GPLv2 obligations,
because I borrowed GPLv2 code. I counter that, no, I borrowed new-BSD
code. She sues me for copyright violation.
If you're correct, then she prevails. But that's madness: It's Bob's
code, and he never specified GPLv2 terms for his property.
No, Alice cannot recover from me for refusing to comply with GPLv2
terms, because I didn't borrow GPLv2 code. Bob cannot recover from
Alice for "involuntary relicensing" of his code to GPLv2, because
she simply did not do that.
Yes, I know that the wording of GPL[23] seems to suggest a requirement
that is, in fact, neither pragmatically nor legally possible. That is
not the interpretation of that clause that actually applies in the real
world. I'm sorry if I come across as impatient, but I've gotten
_really_ tired of arguing the matter over and over.
The view referenced above is, I _think_, the most common mistake in all
of open source licensing -- and it doesn't matter how often I debunk it,
there's always some new person to come along and promote it.
