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Re: plagiarism of reiserfs by Debian



Wouter Verhelst <wouter@grep.be> wrote:
> Op za 19-04-2003, om 22:51 schreef Lukas Geyer:
> > the issue seems to be the fix of #152547. If we are not allowed to
> > remove a screenful of advertising from the output of a program, then
> > this unduly restricts the freedom to distribute modified versions.
> 
> Uhm.
> 
> From the GPL, section 2:
> 
>     c) If the modified program normally reads commands interactively
>     when run, you must cause it, when started running for such
>     interactive use in the most ordinary way, to print or display an
>     announcement including an appropriate copyright notice and a
>     notice that there is no warranty (or else, saying that you provide
>     a warranty) and that users may redistribute the program under
>     these conditions, and telling the user how to view a copy of this
>     License.  (Exception: if the Program itself is interactive but
>     does not normally print such an announcement, your work based on
>     the Program is not required to print an announcement.)
> 
> Otherwise put: if the program shows the 'no warranty' clause from the
> GPL at startup, you may not remove it. Although a 'no warranty' message
> is certainly not the same as a list of sponsors, they both require some
> messages being printed for legalese reasons. I, personally, see nothing
> wrong with that; it certainly doesn't result in software being non-free.

Actually, what Hans Reiser should do is assign copyright for parts of
the work to all of his sponsors.  Then, an "appropriate copyright
notice" would list all of their names.  That would be fully within the
letter of the GPL.

Regards,
Walter Landry
wlandry@ucsd.edu



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