Re: Cheops-ng: DFSG free or non-free?
Wesley W. Terpstra said:
> So, what does that mean for a package where the copyright holder
> distributes the package with an extra clause and GPL? Can I
> redistribute it at all?
>
> PS. Please CC me on replies as I am not subscribed.
IANAL, IANADD, IJRD-L.
The last time this conversation came up, it ended that basically, there are
three possibilities:
If the package contains GPL'd code that is written by someone other than the
main copyright holder (Adtran), then the package is undistributable.
This is because the GPL+advertising is not GPL-compatible.
If the package contains only code copyrighted by Adtran (or at least, code
that is licensed under this strange GPL+advertising license), then the
actual license is not the GPL, but a new GPL-like (but GPL-incompatible)
license that includes this advertising clause as part of its terms and
conditions.
Third, (and this is uncertain legal territory) the work is licensed under
the GPL, since the GPL explicitly delimits the "terms and conditions" in its
text, and the additional requirements in the cited COPYING file are not
legally binding, but are merely a request.
In the second case, the license info for the Debian package should reflect
that it is _not_ licensed under the GPL.
--Joe
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