Re: Combining proprietary code and GPL for in-house use
Anthony Towns <aj@azure.humbug.org.au> writes:
> > The set {FooCorp,WhiteNight} however, *is* doing an illegal copy.
>
> Proof by assertion, I love it.
I wasn't trying to do that; I'll explain.
If a single person distributed the parts together, then that would
clearly be a violation. My use of set-theory syntax was intended to
say only that.
> > Each reviewer embeds a number in the first sentence of his review.
> > ("This is the second book I read this month!" "All 5345 people in my
> > neighborhood loved it"--that sort of thing.) They arrange that the
> > review with the Nth sentence of the novel has the number N in its
> > first sentence.
>
> Further, fair use (or, in .au the explicit allowance to use quotes for
> purposes of criticism) only applies if you're really doing criticism.
> Having a whole bunch of reviews that were automatically parse-able
> would almost certainly not satisfy the requirements for that exception,
> so even if they were never put together there'd still be a copyright
> infringement here.
In the case I gave, they could certainly be real criticism. It's easy
to make them automatically parsable (I gave a fair amount of detail of
the process to make explicit how that would work).
> The scenario we're (I'm) considering explicitly has Debian and FooCorp
> *not* acting in cahoots. Debian's distributing libA because it's useful
> on its own, or because other GPLed software (C, D, E) needs it. Debian
> has no intention or interest in particularly helping out FooCorp.
Right. In such a case, {FooCorp,Debian} would be infringing. Then to
see whether the individuals are, we have to look at whether their
intentions are to be part of an infringing {FooCorp,Debian} combo. In
your example, Debian would have no such intention, but FooCorp would.
That would mean that Debian is not liable, but FooCorp is.
> If I point out specific clauses from a public license that grants each
> actor explicit permission to do what they do, how can the entire play
> possibly be in violation of the license?
Well, because of the rule I gave. It's a general legal rule; it
applies in both civil and criminal contexts all over the map.
The license applies not just to individuals but also to concerted acts
by groups of individuals. And then, we can impute the acts of the
group back onto the individuals to the extent each individual is
intending to be part of such a group.
If the law didn't work this way, then it would be possible to subvert
almost *any* law, by breaking your act up into little pieces,
individually permissable, and splitting the acts among many people.
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