Re: Contributor agreements and copyright assignment (was Re: Really, about udev, not init sytsems)

[Thomas Goirand <zigo@debian.org>]

On 12/05/2012 06:15 AM, Steve Langasek wrote:
> I understand that concern and recognize that this is a not-uncommon
> sentiment among Debian folks; this very closely parallels the question of
> whether one is willing to release software under a BSD license - or the MPL
> - vs. the GPL.  But while some people do object to releasing their patches
> under a BSD license, there's certainly room for BSD code in Debian.  The
> same is true of GPL works with contributor agreements.  Yes, some folks will
> choose not to contribute to it on upstream's terms, but there are still
> plenty of others who will.
I don't really want to go into the CLA debate (others have better
things to share than me about it). But I think we all agree that,
for some in Debian (I'm not talking about myself here), the Ubuntu
CLA is (at least) annoying, to the point it has been mention in the
init debate.

So, my question to you Steve is: has this been discuss inside
Canonical recently? Would it be possible that Canonical rethinks
its contribution policy for at least Upstart (eg: wave the CLA signing
requirement for Upstart)? Or is this something that you think has
very little chance to change?

Cheers,

Thomas