Re: Please pass judgement on X-Oz licence: free or nay?
On Mon, Aug 02, 2004 at 12:45:02PM -0400, Brian Thomas Sniffen wrote:
> Daniel, you'll probably be happier if you set a Mail-Followup-To
> header to ensure you're CC'd.
>
> Daniel Stone <daniels@debian.org> writes:
>
> > Now, with a release only 23 days away (isn't this better already?),
> > we've hit a speedbump. It's been alleged in Debian circles that the
> > XFree86 autoconfig code is non-free[0], and I've filed a release-blocker
> > bug on X.Org[1] accordingly.
>
> Well, there's only one potential problem:
>
> > * Except as contained in this notice, the name of the copyright holder(s)
> > * and author(s) shall not be used in advertising or otherwise to promote
> > * the sale, use or other dealings in this Software without prior written
> > * authorization from the copyright holder(s) and author(s).
>
> That's clearly GPL-incompatible -- I don't know that that's a problem
> for the relevant code, but I'd imagine it would be for *some* X code.
Huh ? It just says that you are not allowed to use the name of the author for
promotion and such ? How is that GPL incompatible ?
> I think it's right on the border of freedom, but on the non-free side
> of that border. It prohibits some true statements -- if I'm trying to
> sell some kiosk to a third party, and he asks me who wrote the
> autoconfig code, I *can't tell him*. That seems pretty weird, in a
> situation in which I allegedly have freedom.
Well you could tell him to look at the copyright notice of the software ?
> I can't even put "Copyright 2004 Ben Bitdiddle, some parts Copyright
> 200x David Dawes" in there. Heck, I can't even write this message,
> talking about how great X.Org's software is and how much I love the
> autoconfig stuff by David Dawes! This very paragraph violates that
> license.
No, i think you exagerate. The prohibition is in advertizing and promotion, so
what you are barred to do is release flyers or software boxes/CD covers with a
"Written by David Dawes" on it.
Seems similar to " you can use, modify, distribute, whatever, except you have
to rename the software and not use the trademarked name or something such",
except that would be even more constraining.
Friendly,
Sven Luther
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