On Tue, Mar 02, 2004 at 05:15:45PM -0500, selussos wrote: > Thanks for the note Ben and cc'ing me as I am not on the debian-legal > list. I will discuss the license in the format recommended by the > OSI and I hope that that clarifies the issues raised and allays all > concerns: > > First, the license in question, which we have termed the X-Oz license > can be found in full at: http://www.x-oz.com/licenses.html. > > The first part of the license (the permission notice) is taken from > the XFree86 1.0 license. The XFree86 1.0 license is the same as the > X.Org license. Since Debian ships versions of XFree86 under that > license, we assume it is considered DSFG-free. [...] > The first three condition clauses are taken from the Apache 1.1 > license, which we again assume to be DSFG-free since Debian ships > versions of Apache that are subject to that license: [...] > The fourth condition is from the XFree86 1.0 license: [...] > And finally our disclaimer notice is also from the Apache 1.1 license. > > THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED ``AS IS'' AND ANY EXPRESSED OR IMPLIED > WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF > MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED. > IN NO EVENT SHALL X-OZ TECHNOLOGIES OR ITS CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE FOR > ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL > DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE > GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS > INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER > IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR > OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN > IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE [...] > Best Regards and thanks for your concern. Thanks for identifying the origin of the component parts of your license; that is indeed useful. However, X-Oz Technolgies, Inc., is not the Apache Software Foundation, nor the XFree86 Project, Inc., and X-Oz is at liberty to interpret the language in your copyright license as it sees fit. X-Oz is not legally bound by the interpretations -- even of the same precise language -- of the Apache Software Foundation and XFree86 Project, Inc. We have actually seen very divergent interpretations of the same language before. For example, most people familar with the traditional BSD license used by the Regents of the University of California regard the language "permission to copy, modify, and distribute this software is hereby granted" as meaning that you can copy, modify, and distribute the software so licensed. But the University of Washington, which applied that language to the PINE mail user agent software, disagrees: In particular, the earliest Pine licenses included the words: "Permission to use, copy, modify, and distribute this software... is hereby granted," but some people tried to pervert the meaning of that sentence to define "this software" to include derivative works of "this software". The intent has always been that you can re-distribute the UW distribution, but if you modify it, you have created a derivative work and must ask permission to redistribute it. There has never been implicit or explicit permission given to redistribute modified or derivative versions without permission.[1] Consequently, we have learned that the copyright holder's interpretation of his, her, or its license does matter. If you could answer the eight questions I posed in an earlier mail I think would shed a lot of light on things. Thanks again for your patience and assistance! [1] http://www.washington.edu/pine/faq/legal.html -- G. Branden Robinson | Mob rule isn't any prettier just Debian GNU/Linux | because you call your mob a branden@debian.org | government. http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |
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