On Sat, Dec 06, 2003 at 04:49:45PM +0100, Måns Rullgård wrote: > Andrew Suffield <asuffield@debian.org> writes: > >> How's that? The GPL allows distribution together with non-GPL works, > >> as long as the non-GPL things are not derived from anything GPL'd. In > >> my opinion, placing two shared objects in the same tar file doesn't > >> make one a derived work of the other. Would it make a difference if > >> the offending (to rms) plugins were distributed separately? > > "Maybe". > > This now gets into the hazy realm where it's best not to go - a court > > could decide either way. > > The argument is, approximately, that by shipping the whole lot > > together you are creating a derived work that violates at least once > > of the licenses. Certainly you can concoct a case where this is > > plausible (wrap them all up in one .deb with a default configuration > > that uses both) - and it is not at all clear where to draw the > > line. There are legitimate arguments in both directions (the > > counter-argument is approximately "It's not derivation, it's > > collation"). > I have a CD that contains lots of GPL stuff, as well as OpenSSL (it's > a Slackware CD). I downloaded it as an iso file from some ftp > server. Apparently, an iso9660 format filesystem containing tar files > of GPL and GPL incompatible software is allowed. Where is the > fundamental difference if the format of the wrapper is changed from > iso9660 to tar, and the internal files are shared objects instead of > tar files? The intent of the distributor in how the individual program bits should be used together, and the feasibility of using them separately. (I.e.: there is *no* fundamental difference between iso9660 and tar for these purposes.) -- Steve Langasek postmodern programmer
Attachment:
signature.asc
Description: Digital signature