MJ Ray wrote:To me, it seems clearly non-free because it terminates if there is legal action against IBM about patents "applicable to" some other software. [...][...] This has the effect of a patent cross-license: "Don't sue us over patents and we won't sue you over patents."
I think your characterisation is a bit off. Doesn't it have the effect: "We license you these patents as long as you don't sue us over any software patents (even if we sue you over other software patents)."
The only circumstance under which the _copyright_ license terminates is if you sue claiming that _the program itself_ violatesyour software patent. This seems perfectly reasonable, and I personallybelieve this license is a Free Software license.
I'm not taking issue with the copyright licence now. The copyright termination aspect seems slightly questionable, cross-contaminated by the patent aspects, but I know I need to think about that some more.
[...] When you sue someone over the software, you are trying to stop people [...]
I'm not taking issue about suing over the covered software, but over some other unrelated software. That should not affect the licence of the covered software AFAICT.
-- MJR/slef My Opinion Only and possibly not of any group I know. http://mjr.towers.org.uk/ http://www.ttllp.co.uk/ for creative copyleft computing