Re: Licensing requirements ???
On Thu, Oct 09, 2003 at 02:01:36PM -0500, Michael D Schleif wrote:
> Also, in order to manage problems and maintain SLA's, this software is
> to be sold as an integral piece of a system -- somewhat of a blackbox.
> In other words, their customers will pay one basic price, and receive an
> installed hardware server, on which Debian and software are installed
> turnkey.
Hmm, there's one point here that others haven't mentioned yet. The
SLAs should not forbid the customers from making modifications to
the GPLed software, because that would contradict section 6 ("You
may not impose any further restrictions on the recipients' exercise
of the rights granted herein."). However, the GPL does allow
this:
"You may charge a fee for the physical act of transferring a copy, and
you may at your option offer warranty protection in exchange for a fee."
You can presumably put whatever conditions you like on that warranty
protection, and on whatever service you offer with it.
I'm not sure how this interacts with any contracts surrounding the
hardware. Would it be okay if you say "you can modify the software
as much as you like, but you're not allowed to run modified software
on this device"? I could discuss that for weeks :-)
Richard Braakman
Reply to: