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Re: The BitTorrent Open Source License



Le mercredi 09 mars 2005 à 10:26 -0600, Christofer C. Bell a écrit :

> The license also seems to contradict itself here:
> 
> > 1.      You may use, sell or give away the Licensed Product, alone or as a component of 
> >          an aggregate software distribution containing programs from several different 
> >          sources.  No royalty or other fee is required.
> 
> This clause states that the Licensed Product can be sold.
> 
> > 2.      Both Source Code and executable versions of the Licensed Product, including 
> >          Modifications made by previous Contributors, are available for your use.  (The terms 
> >          "Licensed Product," "Modifications," "Contributors" and "Source Code" are defined 
> >          in the License.)
> 
> This clause states that the Licensed Product can come in a "source
> code" form.  Note that the licensed product can be sold as per clause
> 1.
> 
> > 6.      If you sublicense the Licensed Product or Derivative Works, you may charge fees 
> >          for warranty or support, or for accepting indemnity or liability obligations to your 
> >          customers.  You cannot charge for the Source Code.
> 
> This clause prohibits the charging of money for the source code form
> of the licensed product which we've already been granted license to
> sell by the clauses 1 and 2.

This is not the license itself, but the preamble. And even taking it as
a part of the license, you could still sell a hello world C program
alongside, and you could charge for it. We always considered such things
free.

> The point about not being allowed to sell the source code (as per
> clause 6) seems out of placed based on what I believe the intent of
> the clause to be.  Regardless, saying via the first two clauses that
> one can sell the source code, and then saying in clause 6 that you
> can't is a pretty clear self-contradiction in my opinion.

I think the author meant you cannot charge an *extra fee* for the source
code.
-- 
 .''`.           Josselin Mouette        /\./\
: :' :           josselin.mouette@ens-lyon.org
`. `'                        joss@debian.org
   `-  Debian GNU/Linux -- The power of freedom



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