Re: cdrecord: weird GPL interpretation

[Måns Rullgård <mru@mru.ath.cx>]

Francesco Poli <frx@firenze.linux.it> writes:

> Hi all,
> in cdrtools-2.01a38 I found the following weird GPL interpretation.
> I wonder if this is considered acceptable for main (I would say that
> this is non-free). I don't know whether cdrecord links with (or is
> otherwise a derivative work of) other GPL'd software (whose copyright is
> held by other people): in that case I would say that this is even
> undistributable...  :(
>
> What do you think about this?
> There already is a Debian BTS bug report
> (http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=265546) about this
> issue (it was filed when it was even worse, it seems...), but it says
> it's resoved with version 2.01a38. I wonder if you agree...
>
> NOTE: I am Cc:ing the the package maintainer (Joerg Jaspert) and the
> bug-report filer (Andreas Metzler).
> I don't know if they would like to be Mail-Followup:ed...
>
> Issue description follows:
>
>  -=-=-=-= cdrecord/LICENSE =-=-=-=-
>
> This software is under GPL but you should read the following
> clarifications:
>
> -       You may not modify certain copyright messages in cdrecord.c
>
>         See cdrecord.c for further information.

Looks like an invariant section of GFDL infamy.

> -       You may (with a few exceptions) not modify the location of the
>         configuration file /etc/default/cdrecord.
>
>         See defaults.c for further information.

Looks like lunacy.  I don't recall ever reading anything about that in
the GPL.

> Please note that this is just the way I interpret the GPL and as this
> is my software, users should follow my interpretation of the GPL and not
> use their own different interpretations.
>
>  -=-=-=-= cdrecord/cdrecord.c (sorry for linewrapping) =-=-=-=-

I take it someone on this list followed the recent flame war on lkml.

-- 
Måns Rullgård
mru@mru.ath.cx