Re: comparison of public licenses?

On Fri, 28 Jan 2000, Stephen B. Schott <sschott[_at_]sglm.com> wrote:
>
> licenses in law journals.
>
> The GNU General Public License (GPL) <http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html>:
> The GPL is a copyright license. Its terms allow for the modification
> and distribution of the software by the licensee as long as the Program
> is always distributed with the license and copyright notice. Any
> modifications of the original copyright holder's program must be
> conspicuously noted.

True.

> The license allows for a licensee to sell the unmodified Program
> for the cost of making the copy and also allows the licensee to
> offer warranties on the software (otherwise the software comes
> with all warranties disclaimed -- this is part of the license).

False -- the wording of part 1 is:

   You may charge a fee for the physical act of transferring a copy,    and you may at your option offer warranty protection in exchange    for a fee.

There is nothing here to limit you to the cost of making the copy, and I have never seen any indication from the FSF to support your claim (quite the opposite).

> It does not allow for the licensee to sell the Program for a fee if she
> made changes to the Program (the licensee can't profit from a derivative
> work) (there are other conditions but these are the highlights).

False again. I believe you are referring to clause 2b:

   b. 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.

It says the license (GPL) must come at no charge, not the copy. You can still sell copies for as much as you want to charge.

> Any violation of the license terminates the license, thus opening
> up the licensee to copyright infringement.

True.

> Someone suggested that the copyright holder often assigns their
> rights to an organization like the Free Software Foundation (FSF-
> <http://www.fsf.org/fsf/fsf.html>) and that's true. This allows
> versions of software to come from one source and more importantly
> brings together a little more weight when seeking to enforce a
> license against a party breaching (No breachee has ever made it beyond
> the letter-writing stage and there is no case law enforcing the GPL
> yet). In general, the average programmer doesn't have the resources
> or legal knowledge to deal with infringers and so the FSF, acting as
> the copyright-holder's assignee, will enforce those rights.

True enough (though I wish the avg programmer did have the resources and legal knowledge - the courts are supposed to be for everybody, after all).

Lynn

Lynn Winebarger
<owinebar[_at_]free-expression.org> Received on Sun Jan 30 2000 - 23:20:28 GMT