Re: Fwd: figlet license change from Artistic to Clarified Artistic or Artistic 2.0?
On Sun, Oct 17, 2004 at 01:23:42PM +0200, Francesco Poli wrote:
> "stating that *you* changed the files" is weaker than requiring "stating
> that you changed the files and stating which *your name* is".
>
> Requiring that the modifier's name is placed in a comment line fails the
> Dissident Test.
People have many names -- family names, personal names, irc handles,
trademarks, nicknames, pen names, pseudonyms, informal names, ...
The general case of a requirement for a name which does not also specify
that that name be unique and/or be witnessed and/or be notarized and/or
appear on some kind of government certificate or other document and/or
be contact information does not seem to me to fail the dissident test.
Ok, if the requirement for a name required that it appear in some sort
of legal document, I'd see that as failing the dissident test. Or,
if the name needed to be accompanied by a signature. Or, if there were
some other indicator that the name had lasting legal significance.
But a name on list of changed files?
It's not even asking for the name of the copyright holder for those
changes. [If it was, you could assign copyright to some arbitrary
organization and put that name on it, which should satisfy the dissident
test.]
Putting a name in a file -- when that name doesn't need to be the name
of the copyright holder, nor be useable as contact information, and when
the file's purpose is only to indicate that changes have been made --
doesn't seem to me to involve any dissident risk. At least, not if the
dissident in question knows that they are a dissident and also chooses
to avoid using contact information as a name.
--
Raul
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