Re: Bug#386406: libmms: majormms haven't yet granted relicensing to LGPL
Hi,
On Thu, Sep 14, 2006, Anon Sricharoenchai wrote:
> So I could give another example.
> If the new project copy code from Qt and the project itself is licensed under
> LGPL. While it is obviously that some parts of code is from Qt, and no any
> approval from trolltech to be relicensed, Debian will still ship it under
> LGPL?
You forget two assumptions. The new project also claims that Trolltech
has relicensed the code, and Trolltech is hard to reach. If is a
question of trust between Debian and the "project". It also depends of
the suspicions one has on said licensing, obviously.
> > > If Debian redistribute this package in freeware license, Debian will risk to
> > > get sued by Microsoft?
> >
> > Yes.
> Debian will also risk to get sued by majormms author or by trolltech?
Technically, they could, but normal companies following standard
procedures will first request to fix our licensing clauses (our
copyright files) or to remove the affected contents from our servers.
If we react in a reasonable time frame, everybody is happy. If we
don't, they could go as far as suing you, and we might get fined.
> Majormms or trolltech may claim that they loss revenue, if someone got LGPL
> privilege to link the library in their proprietary/close-source application,
> while the library still contain GPL code from majormms/trolltech that do not
> allow anyone to link the code in close source program.
Sure. And a court will evaluate whether we acted in good faith, and
might even turn the blame only towards the project who Debian trusted,
not necessarily to Debian or at least not only to Debian. And the
court might also consider the non-commercial position of Debian, and
its reaction to the claims of Majormms or Trolltech, and evaluate the
real loss of revenue for an incorrectly licensed GPL work as LGPL...
> > We can always argue that we did a mistake, and try our best to repair
> > it.
> It sounds like that Debian will keep the package in non-free as long as
> there's no any action from Microsoft?
No, because it's trivial to check that the Microsoft DLLs are not
freely redistribuable. You can identify the same DLLs. Beside, the
upstream project which Debian is supposed to trust is supposed to come
to Debian with a good story for the origin of these DLLs.
> Even that the upstream author obviously said that those binary is from Windows
> Media Player, Debian will still distribute it under non-free, until it has
> some claim from Microsoft?
No.
> > So, no, I don't intend to just relicense it as GPL if this is not
> > required.
> Now, I agree with Don Armstrong, that debian can distribute this library under
> LGPL, but with some exception note that obviously say that some parts of code
> from majormms is still GPL.
But I don't want to do that if the actual code is LGPL, and I currently
think it is. Why would I trust you more than the upstream project
where I got the files from? Why would the Debian project trust you?
Do you work at Major MMS? Did you maintain a derivative project from
their code? Did you contact Major MMS?
Besides, the less facts and fresh information you bring with you, the
less I'll be inclined to trust you as the discussion continues over
time: I'll suspect you try by all means to relicense libmms.
> GStreamer can still be LGPL as long as it hasn't been compiled with mms
> support enabled.
Yes, the actual GStreamer code will always be LGPL, but please refer to
my previous messages: I always mentionned the runtime license of the
result. Even if it doesn't matter *for Debian*, it might matter for
people using Debian and GStreamer and the mms plugin to have a
resulting LGPL runtime license and not a GPL one as they might be using
the stack in a proprietary product which needs mms support and that
they don't want to GPL.
> And GStreamer's debian/copyright should also clearly state that most parts of
> code is licensed under LGPL except some parts of mms support that is GPL.
> (This mean that if someone want to link GStreamer with close-source
> application, they must disable mms support in GStreamer)
Well, each source and binary packages are responsible for their own
license. It's not the business of the GStreamer packages to document
what licenses are incompatible with GStreamer.
This issue is discussed in Debian bug #317129:
<http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=317129>
(And was already discussed on debian-legal@.)
> http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=xine-devel&m=107261185004445&w=2
> \begin{quote}
> > > you might need to ask "Major MMS" too ;-)
> >
> > Heh, is there any way to contact him? He seems to be some sort of
> > nameless hero, and that may complicate matters.
> \end{quote}
> This obviously show that they haven't even contacted the majormms author.
This URL is already quoted in the copyright file... It's not like
you've discovered something new.
> And according to,
> http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=xine-devel&m=110376804906666&w=2
> we can also assume that only the codes from xine, and the new codes added by
> libmms, is relicensed.
> They haven't said anything about relicensing majormms codes, then we can
> assume that majormms codes haven't yet been relicensed.
You are assuming this. And upstream claims that libmms is "being
available as library, licensed under GNU Library General Public Licence
(LGPL)".
Again, this is referenced in the copyright file. Everybody has the
same information as me when I declared it could be uploaded LGPL.
> > Even if relicensing the Debian package would have some consequences, I
> > am open to this solution *if* this has some factual and recent ground.
> > I currently didn't see any useful new piece of information, and would
> > like to get convinced that the licensing is required (since I had
> > already convinced myself that the LGPL was fine when I prepared the
> > package in the first place).
> It won't be fine if someone use this library in proprietary (or any
> GPL-incompatible), and if this is not what majormms author want, he may come
> out to claim his right, and Debian (including libmms) may be sued.
It won't be fine for the consumers of libmms based stacks *outside of
Debian*. As far as I know, Debian does not ship packages incompatible
with a GPL-ed libmms.
I'm not deliberately making a promess of a LGPL libmms library in order
to trick propreitary application authors relying on Debian to have sane
licenses. I am using what I believe is the appropriate license for the
libmms library in Debian and the upstream license.
I already suggested what you could do in order to make me change my
mind on the status of the GPL versus LGPL licensing of libmms; please
refer to my earlier messages if you truly want to clarify this
(upstream) issue.
For the record, the decision to license as LGPL was taken during the
discussion of the ITP, with James Troup (I think he reviewed libmms for
Ubuntu and he is a Debian ftpmaster); see Debian #330355 for details:
<http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=330355>
Bye,
--
Loïc Minier <lool@dooz.org>
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