GPL , what does it mean? -- the name that is.

[Lloyd Budd <lloyd@foolswisdom.com>]

Hello,

I imagine that many of us are familiar with the documented origin
of the GNU General Public License (GPL)
<http://www.free-soft.org/gpl_history/>
but where does the name come from?

Was "general" a common term in licenses then?  It does seem that
general (, generally) are regularly used by Mr. Stallman,

What about "public"?  Were "public licenses" common?

Any insights are appreciated,
Thank you,
Lloyd


PS I discussed this with my local LUG, but no one knew the answer.
Not discouraged, I thought if there is any mailing list that might
know, it is debial-legal.