On Mon, 2004-08-09 at 04:59, MJ Ray wrote: > On 2004-08-09 10:38:45 +0100 Joe Wreschnig <piman@debian.org> wrote: > > > I don't see the difference. I mean, I see the difference that one can > > be > > read as an "assertion" and the other can be read as a "clause". But I > > don't see how that affects any practical or legal conclusions. In > > other > > words, if I write a license like the BSD one, but append "You will > > wear > > a hat on Fridays." I think it will be clear to everyone, including a > > judge, that I intend that to be a requirement to use the freedoms set > > forth in the license, even though it's just an "assertion" rather > > than a > > "clause". > > That's not the impression I have, especially given the "clarification" > posts from X-Oz. Does someone know the legal reasoning of this? Would > the same hold if you appended "You may not wear a hat on Fridays" > which I think is closer to the BSD wording? The entire X license is written in an assertoric rather than imperative manner. All conditions are phrased with "X shall Y" or "X is Y" rather than "You shall do X". A study of differing legal interpretations between assertoric statements and imperative clauses in licenses may be interesting. I also think it's enough hair-splitting that we shouldn't bother with it. I guess I'm also convinced that just because it's not numbered like it is in the BSD license, doesn't make it not a clause. That is, the X license says "Permission is hereby granted... subject to the following conditions:" and then goes on to lay out the requirement that the copyright notice be preserved; then the warranty disclaimer; then the paragraph in question. At no point is it obvious to me that "the following conditions" is ending and being replaced by something else. > MJ Ray wrote: > >> No-one found a licence with a similar *condition* in it. > > The 3rd clause of the 3 clause BSD license. > > That says "may not be used to endorse or promote products derived from > this software" while the X-Oz one says "shall not be used in > advertising or otherwise to promote the sale, use or other dealings in > this Software". There's the difference in verb, which I think is > substantial, and I think X-Oz has added sufficient lawyerbombs to make > me a lot more uncomfortable with it than the 3 clause BSD one. > > I suspect we also have more postitive clarifications about the BSD > one. It is possible we will get a bizarre interpretation from a > particular licensor, but we'll deal with that when it happens. Since I don't buy that it's not actually a clause, the whole of XFree86 licensing stands up as positive clarification of a free interpretation of this. > > I made a case elsewhere that > > the X wording is actually less restrictive because it only affects the > > original software, where the BSD clause affects all derived software. > > Do both affect derived software, because we need copyright permission > for the original in order to use the derived, which would otherwise > infringe copyright of the original? They both affect derived software in the sense that they place some conditions you, which you must meet to derive from the software. However, those conditions only apply to The Software in the X license; they only apply to derived software in the BSD license. Personally I think this is extreme hair splitting; I was using it as an example of why I think it's silly to claim the BSD license is free and this one isn't. -- Joe Wreschnig <piman@debian.org>
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