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Re: Apple Public Source License APSL v1.2 2001-01-04 www.publicsource.apple.com/apsl/



> Scripsit Wichert Akkerman <wichert@wiggy.net>
> > Previously Henning Makholm wrote:
> 
> > > I think this is non-free. It means that people without net access
> > > cannot receive the software on disks from a friend and later give
> > > the friend back a bugfixed version.
> 
> > Does it say `immediately' or `electronically' ?
> 
> It says:
> 
> |     (c) You must make Source Code of all Your Deployed Modifications
> |     publicly available under the terms of this License, including the
> |     license grants set forth in Section 3 below, for as long as you
> |     Deploy the Covered Code or twelve (12) months from the date of
> |     initial Deployment, whichever is longer. You should preferably
> |     distribute the Source Code of Your Deployed Modifications
> |     electronically (e.g. download from a web site); and
> 
> There may be a loophole in "preferably" (which I didn't notice
> before). However, I'm inclined to think that even
> 
> ?| You must agree to give your modifications to anyone who sends
> ?| you a floppy disk and a SASE within one year.
> 
> would be non-free, simply because it requires the user to keep his
> modifications around at all. For example, it means that a fire or a
> disk crash may place the user in legal jeopardy - it is certainly
> unreasonable if the licence effectively requires that users invest
> in back-up hardware and fireproof storage for his backup tapes.

This argument seems to keep the software out of Debian altogether.  I
don't think that Debian keeps every single modification around for 12
months.  There can be a number of updates in rapid succession.  We
keep the modifications for the current version, but not all of the
older versions.

Regards,
Walter Landry
landry@physics.utah.edu



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