Re: IBM Public License (again)
Walter Landry <wlandry@ucsd.edu> wrote:
> MJ Ray <mjr@dsl.pipex.com> wrote:
> > On 2004-05-13 02:53:33 +0100 Walter Landry <wlandry@ucsd.edu> wrote:
> >
> > > MJ Ray <mjr@dsl.pipex.com> 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. [...]
> > >
> > > It only terminates a patent license, not a copyright license. That
> > > just makes the license effectively mute about patents (which is true
> > > of most licenses we look at). Patents were also discussed for an
> > > Intel license [1].
> >
> > This seems rather worse than being mute about patents, putting IBM in
> > a position of strength if software patents are involved.
>
> Hmm. I guess I read license a little too quickly. What is rather
> amusing is that IBM has now lost all of its patent rights anyone else
> may have given them, since they counter-sued SCO over some patent
> rights.
Gah. I really have to read more carefully. I read the license again,
and it says that you have to sue a Contributor or sue about a patent
related to the Program. So if SCO had distributed stuff under the IBM
CPL, then IBM would have lost all patent rights. It still sounds like
a license bug, but not quite so serious.
Regards,
Walter Landry
wlandry@ucsd.edu
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