Re: ldp-es_20002103-7_i386.changes REJECTED
Scripsit David Starner <starner@okstate.edu>
> Javier Fernández-Sanguino Peña wrote:
> > Contrary to what people might think, not only can I
> > chance the license of version X, I can change the license of version X
> > minus 1, X minus 2, X minus 3...
> You can certainly offer it under a new license; but normally you can't
> retract the old license.
There's a school of thought that says that an old free licence *can*
be retracted in common-law countries, because of the "consideration
theory" which basically says that unilateral promises cannot be
enforced against the person making the promise.
This argument is not by any means universally accepted. The
counterargument goes that the free testing and debugging implied by
the "Open Source" mechanism does in itself constitue sufficient
"consideration" to hold the original licensor to his promise.
In any case, the strict consideration argument would imply that
DFSG-freedom of a license is *impossible* under common law - so
whether or not it is true, it is not pragmatically a useful basis for
discussion on debian-legal. So we all tacitly assume that one *can*
make irrevocable promises, irrespective of whether we think it would
be possible to convince a court of the contrary.
In most continental European legal systems, the case is clearer: Over
here, a promise is a promise and can be enforced legally even if
unilateral.
All that aside, there is a clear and longstanding consensus on -legal
that a license that explicitly declares itself revocable cannot be
DFSG-free.
--
Henning Makholm "Nett hier.
Aber waren Sie schon mal in Baden-Württemberg?"
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