Re: Proposed Apache license & patent/reciprocity issues

[Sam Hartman <hartmans@debian.org>]

>>>>> "MJ" == MJ Ray <mjr@dsl.pipex.com> writes:

    MJ> On 2003-11-15 04:14:44 +0000 Walter Landry <wlandry@ucsd.edu>
    MJ> wrote:
    >> It only revokes the patent license, not the whole license.
    >> Since Debian, to a large extent, only concerns itself with
    >> patents that are being enforced, it was considered fine [1].
    >> There was even a comment praising the patent stuff [2].
    >> Basically, if there was a patent being enforced then Debian
    >> might start worrying about these clauses.

    MJ> I think I can buy this. We evaluate the licence as if it
    MJ> contains no patent grants and see if that minimal state still
    MJ> meets the DFSG. The licence must only revoke the non-essential
    MJ> grants in this case and not the entire licence.

I also buy this.  

I believe that the needs of the free software community are best met
by patnet strategies that make it more expensive and difficult to
enforce patents.  And so to the extent we can do so while still being
consistent with the letter of the DFSG, we should be sympathetic to
such attempts.

We do not want to get in the position of evaluating the validity of
patents and I do not think we want to penalize people for granting
patent licenses to the community as a hole even if those licenses have
strange strings attached.