Re: Are GPLed .gifs legal at all ???
On Thu, 13 Jul 2000, Tomasz Wegrzanowski wrote:
> > But you CAN modify GIFs, you just cannot use LZW compression on the
> > result.
>
> These images are INTENDED to be COMPRESSED.
And, where is the problem? You can load them in a hex-editor and modify
whatever you want. You can get something like a source-code by changing it
to a pixmap. That some people have no "compiler", that makes it to a gif
in the same format the original was, is problem in my eyes, as there are
other ways within the same format.
When a had a comercial, properitary compiler, compiled GPLd Code with it
and distributed it with the source, would you also sue me, that I do
illegal?!
> Mere existence of nonLZW gifs doesn't make any difference to FACT that,
> due to patent problems, one can't modify LZW gifs.
you can modify them. You can modify an hex-edit and you can edit the image
represented. The only thing you can not do is to have the same compression
within the file, *only* *if* you don't have the appropitiate program for
doing so.
> There is legal problem.
> Problem is that LZW gifs aren't free, therefore :
They ARE free.
> and Debian breaks GPL distributing them
How does Debian break GPL, even in the non-case, that they weren't free?
Hochachtungsvoll,
Bernhard R. Link
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