Re: The GPL and soundfonts
On Mon, Jun 04, 2007 at 03:41:29PM -0400, Michael Pobega wrote:
> > Although I would agree with that, the main matter here is not whether
> > this WAV file would be appropriate for main or contrib, but whether it
> > is distributable at all, since the GPLv2 requires complete source code,
> > which includes "the scripts used to control compilation and installation
> > of the executable".
> >
> > Regards,
> > Thadeu Cascardo.
> >
> >
>
> In that case then I believe that the WAV would be undistributable, since
> the program used to create/compile it (Depending upon how you look at
> it) is undistributable under the GPL. So would that throw the WAV file
> in non-free?
>
No! Non-free is for distributable software. Non-distributable means you
would infringe someone's copyright if you ever distributed the work.
There are those software which are distributable (in the sense that, in
some conditions, you could distribute it), but those conditions are not
appropriate for distributing in Debian (even in non-free). For example,
if Debian had to pay a fee for each copy made by a user.
The solution here would be to ask the MIDI author to distribute it under
another license.
IANADD,
Thadeu Cascardo.
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