Re: User's thoughts about LPPL
On Mon, 2002-07-22 at 03:38, David Carlisle wrote:
>
> > But you have *no* way to assure this, short of trademarking the name
> > "latex".
>
> That is a very tired argument.
And this is not?
> Of course it is true as written, but it ignores the fact that LPPL has
> been remarkably successful in its stated aims.
"Tired", I observe, is entirely in the eye of the beholder.
Say, rather:
"I am unwilling to compromise on this matter, or consider other avenues
of meeting our mutual goals."
> Prior to the latex2e licence (which from which LPPL was derived)
> "latex" could be (and often was) locally modified and re-distributed.
> It got so bad by around 1990 that passing a latex document from one site
> to another was largely a matter of luck.
Registering "LaTeX" as a trademark would have given you much more power
(i.e. real power) to discourage such things without requiring such high
standards for others wanting to play around with the code.
> > Make a derivate work of latex, which is variant, and called
> > "special-non-latex".
> >
> > Make a package with no derivatives of latex at all, which contains a
> > single symlink: 'latex -> special-non-latex'.
> >
> > Happy with that?
>
> Happy with the first but not the second which, taken with the first,
> would be producing a derived work and re-using the latex name.
The second is outside of your power to prevent, as it (or its
equivalent) can be done without reference to your work, and therefore
does not fall under your legal purvey.
For example, here is a Python wrapper that makes no reference to LaTeX:
-----
#!/usr/bin/python
import sys
import os
program = sys.argv[0] + "-fake"
os.execv(program, sys.argv)
-----
Now, if my hacked LaTeX is named "latex-fake", I can symlink my program
above to "latex", and "latex foo.tex" will invoke my fake LaTeX. You
have no recourse because you retain neither any legal right to my
program above nor any trademark rights to the name "latex".
Don't reinvent the wheel. If you want the legal assurance of a
trademark, just go and get one.
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