Re: LinuxLand's strange copyright notices

[Henning Makholm <henning@makholm.net>]

Scripsit tb@becket.net (Thomas Bushnell, BSG)

> But the copyright on the whole must still be compatible with the
> copyright on each piece, and I don't think (but I'm not sure) that
> the GPL would permit this kind of shenanigan.

The question is, is there really a compound work? Or are there just
two separate works (being Debian and the vendor's artwork) that merely
happen to be carried on opposite sides of the same medium? In the
latter case, it would be perfectly acceptable for the vendor to
assert his copyright to the artwork without getting in conflict
to GPL.

The composite copyright need not be involved at all: Once the
vendor has his artwork (one of the pieces) copyrighted he already
has the power to forbid anybody from creating entire copies of
the "cd + software + artwork" object.

This doesn't affect people's right to make copies of the
software alone, though.

-- 
Henning Makholm               "... not one has been remembered from the time
                         when the author studied freshman physics. Quite the
            contrary: he merely remembers that such and such is true, and to
          explain it he invents a demonstration at the moment it is needed."