Re: NEW ocaml licence proposal by upstream, will be part of the 3.08.1 release going into sarge.

[Raul Miller <moth@debian.org>]

> > On Tue, Aug 24, 2004 at 02:19:32PM -0400, Brian Thomas Sniffen wrote:

> >> Please cite relevant text from the GPL.

> Raul Miller <moth@debian.org> writes:
> > Section 9.

On Tue, Aug 24, 2004 at 04:40:25PM -0400, Brian Thomas Sniffen wrote:
> I don't see anything in there about the FSF replacing my license to
> Emacs 21 with something else.  The part which binds me, instead of the
> FSF, is this:
> 
>   Each version is given a distinguishing version number.  If the
>   Program specifies a version number of this License which applies to
>   it and "any later version", you have the option of following the
>   terms and conditions either of that version or of any later version
>   published by the Free Software Foundation.  If the Program does not
>   specify a version number of this License, you may choose any version
>   ever published by the Free Software Foundation.
> 
> So I have Emacs under version 2 or any later version.  I don't want
> any later version right now, so I'll take it under GPL v2 for the
> forseeable future.  Where's the bit where the FSF can replace my
> license?

What's your role here?  Are you the copyright holder, a developer of
some change or some downstream user?

Let's imagine that you're not the copyright holder, but that instead
you're the developer who submits some change.  Let's also imagine that
the change goes into some debian package which is distributed as a part of
main.  For added fun, let's imagine that the package in question is gcc,
and let's imagine that someone at the FSF has downloaded the software
in question from a debian mirror.  [I hope none of these assumptions
seem particularly outrageous.]

Now, it's true that there is no version 3 of the gpl right now.  So here's
where we get into completely hypothetical land:

The FSF could release a GPL version 3 which has completely arbitrary
terms.  If control of the FSF had passed to someone unscrupulous, these
terms might be proprietary.  [I'm not saying this is a likely scenario,
just a possible one -- I hope this hypothesis seems particularly
outrageous.]

Anyways, that's something only the FSF can do with gcc licensing --
no one else can.

More simply, I'm asserting that the QPL relicense clause is similar in
spirit (though not in implementation) to section 9 of the GPL.

-- 
Raul