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Re: Final text of GPL v3



On Mon, 2 Jul 2007 23:21:30 +0100 Anthony W. Youngman wrote:

> This date is NOT arbitrary. It is AFTER this clause was first
> discussed.
> 
> There are two reasons for this. Firstly, many jurisdictions implicitly
> or explicitly forbid retro-activeness. Without this date, there's a
> good  chance the clause would be declared legally invalid.

I cannot understand how it could be retroactive.

Since the GNU GPL v3 has been released on 29 June 2007, no work has been
licensed under its terms prior to 29 June 2007, and hence no provision
can be retroactive.
A company which entered in a discriminatory agreement prior to 28 March
2007, will find out that now is not allowed to distribute GPLv3ed works.
What's retroactive about this?

If a company entered prior to 1989 into a weird agreement forbidding the
distribution of source code, would we say that GPL sections that mandate
availability of source are retroactive?

See also my comment:
http://gplv3.fsf.org/comments/rt/summarydecision.html?filename=%3C%&id=3227


The usual disclaimers: IANAL, TINLA, IANADD, TINASOTODP, IANAENS.

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