Re: Question about the old BSD license and GPL (gtkipmsg)
On Thu, 21 Jun 2001, Raul Miller wrote:
>On Thu, Jun 21, 2001 at 11:12:58AM -0400, Chloe Hoffman wrote:
>> If we're talking about enforcement of copyright in a court of law, then I
>> would note, as summarized by Eugene Volokh
>> (http://www.law.ucla.edu/faculty/volokh/copyinj.htm#IIA):
>>
>> In Harper & Row, Publishers, Inc. v. Nation Enterprises,91 the Supreme
>> Court made clear that copyright law is substantively constitutional:
>> the First Amendment does not shield speech that infringes another's
>> copyright.92 Copyright, the Court said, is itself an "engine of free
>> expression" because it "supplies the economic incentive to create and
>> disseminate ideas."93
>
>Bleah.
>
>Ok, if the advertising clause in enforcable, then I think we've got
>a problem.
>
>We declare (in the social contract) that the BSD license is a DFSG
>license. To my knowledge, we don't have any mechanism in place to meet
>the advertising requirement of the original BSD license (nor that of
>similar licenses, such as Apache).
>
>If what you're saying is correct, I see several choices:
>
>[1] Modify Debian policy and procedures so that we have an "advertising
>boilerplate" for every distribution, with a line for every package which
>has an advertising clause. [Lots of work.]
Debian's already doing this to some small extent by calling it Debian
GNU/Linux. You see, the GPL doesn't have the ad clause, yet Debian's
acknowledging the GNU project's contribution: where's the problem is doing
this for others where the licenses require it? I find a requirement to
do something as distasteful as you, but This is more like a requirement to
tip your hat to everybody, not just the pretty girls (no offense meant to
anyone :): they're requiring Debian to do something it's doing for others.
Besides, it IS the Right Thing To Do: Let Debian be the moral leadership
of the community again: this time by taking an active stance toward giving
credit where credit is due rather than protracted licensing battles that
stain both parties.
>[2] Modify the DFSG (so that it specifies the modified BSD license in
>the example of DFSG licenses, and indicates that requiring people to
>do extra work not normally associated with handling of software is just
>as bad as requiring payment of a fee) and remove the offending packages
>from the distribution. [Lots of work, lots of time.]
Also drop the existing credit where credit is due: if you're going to say
it's "too much work", you'd best follow through with proof. Also see my
response to point 4 as to the feasability...
>[3] Pretend that what we're doing is perfectly legal and wait for the
>eventual explosion. [Disgusting]
Also just wrong: failing to give credit where credit is due is moraly
reprehensible, especially when legally required to do so.
>[4] Convince every author of such software to change their license.
>[Lots of work, lots of time, may not be doable.]
Probably won't be: OpenSSL would be a serious PITA, and I doubt that
Debian could survive removal of all things dependent on OpenSSL (putting
in non-free is for all intents and purposes removal).
>
--
Pardon me, but you have obviously mistaken me for someone who gives a
damn.
email galt@inconnu.isu.edu
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