Re: Font license recommendation

[Lars Hellström <Lars.Hellstrom@math.umu.se>]

At 00.53 +0200 2002-08-03, Thomas Bushnell, BSG wrote:
>Lars Hellström  <Lars.Hellstrom@math.umu.se> writes:
>
>> I doubt this argument could work. However if it did then it certainly would
>> provide a technical solution to the (obnoxious?) GPL incompatibility
>> problem: just design the linker so that it pads the executable with markup
>> saying "beginning/end of material that is part of the work XXX", and then
>> claim the file is an aggrevation of different works, which just happens to
>> be interpreted as an executable program by the OS.
>
>Since things like intention matter--and not just technical
>mechanism--this is just FUD.

"FUD" ?

On what do you base your opinion that intent has any significance for
whether the GPL allows an action? It clearly says

  You may not copy, modify, sublicense, or distribute the Program
  except as expressly provided under this License.  Any attempt
  otherwise to copy, modify, sublicense or distribute the Program is
  void, and will automatically terminate your rights under this License.

and I don't see any reference in it to the intent of the licensee (only to
the intent of the license, but that is something quite different).

Furthermore I don't see that there would necessarily be any difference in
intent. Certainly if one writes a program whose only purpose is to
demonstrate a legal loophole there would be a difference in intent, but
that isn't the interesting case. In the interesting case the intent is to
"make a single file program, incorporating various pieces of free software
(some of which are GPL and some of which are GPL-incompatible), that does
X". The "X" could be to display a certain picture; PS files can have this
intent, but there are also C programs with the same intent.

And just to make sure we're clear on what my point is: Incorporating a
GPLed font in a PS document does, in contrast to what you claimed, have (in
many cases) unwanted legal implications; if it didn't then there would be a
simple workaround for GPL-incompatibility.

Lars Hellström