Re: APSL 2.0
Jeremy Hankins <nowan@nowan.org> writes:
> How about a web server, instead? Do you think that
> using a web server to make your content available to others qualifies
> as providing a service? Do you think Apple thinks so?
>
> In the list you referenced, the service goes electronic when Joe
> receives the document via email, munges it, and sends it back.
So a hypothetical Amazon 1990, which receives a request over e-mail
and responds by sending a package via physical mail, is not an
electronic service? Neither is Gutenberg-USPS, which will e-mail me a
document in response to a physical request, no SASE required?
> Even there, I think it's hard to claim that Joe is using the
> "Covered Code, alone or as part of a Larger Work, in any way to
> provide a service."
This confuses me. How can you not say, when Joe's using the covered
code to perform typesetting for others, that he's not using it in any
way to provide a service?
>> Also true, but I think it's more about the fundamental problem that this
>> is a non-free restriction than about abuse by licensors.
>
> I'm not convinced we can clearly get non-free out of the DFSG on this
> one. I don't buy the discrimination against fields of endeavor, and
> unlike the affero GPL this isn't a restriction on modification.
>
> It's a restriction, yes. And not one I particularly like, if the
> truth be known. But the analogy between this restriction and the
> source-redistribution restriction of the GPL is simply too strong for
> me to ignore it. If you assume that the definition of "Externally
> Deploy" (or more specifically, "provide a service") is going to be
> reasonable I have trouble seeing where you can say it's not DFSG free.
Copyright law does not grant any control over a third party's use, but
only on modification and distribution. The GNU GPL's
source-redistribution requirement only kicks in when attempting to do
something normally forbidden by copyright law. That is, it lifts the
barrier of copyright law, but only part way.
This license, the APSL, imposes a barrier on things copyright law
doesn't cover. What happens if I choose to refuse the license -- can
I ignore the APSL then? For example, let's say I hire Modifiers,
Inc. to take an APSL2-covered work and modify it. They comply with
the APSL, and post it on their web site. They also hand me a hard
drive with the software on it. I use that drive in a computer which
provides a web service. I decline to accept Apple's license to modify
or distribute their code. All I'm doing is using it, so they can't
touch me.
The above paragraph mostly says that the APSL is a bad idea and may be
unenforceable; if you don't buy that, at least consider the original
argument: that a restriction in addition to those imposed by copyright
law is necessarily non-free.
-Brian
--
Brian T. Sniffen bts@alum.mit.edu
http://www.evenmere.org/~bts/
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