Re: Sapphire.cpp -- Gpl compatible? DFSG-free?

[Ben Finney <ben+debian@benfinney.id.au>]

Andrew Donnellan <ajdlinux@gmail.com> writes:

> Whilst they might technically still hold copyright, I wonder if a
> court would consider a statement like 'Dedicated to the public domain'
> to be an all-permissive licence grant, given the common English
> meaning of the phrase. Probably hasn't been tested in court.

I'm convinced by the sum of arguments given by Rick Moen on this topic
<URL:http://linuxmafia.com/faq/Licensing_and_Law/public-domain.html>.

    Summary: The commendably generous act of purporting to place a
    copyright-covered work into the public domain before the expiration
    of its copyright term has a number of problems. (Note that, for a
    property to truly become public domain, its ownership title must
    cease to exist. Therefore, it is not sufficient for the owner of
    record to declare "I wish to no longer be regarded as the owner of
    this property.")

He also points to the opinion of many that requiring a work to have a
copyright holder, and the inability to actively cause a work to have
*no* copyright holder, is considered a feature: it means that liability
for the work's effects can always, in theory, be attributed to some
responsible party.

So I'm not at all confident in the outcome of a putative judgement on
such attempts to put a work in the public domain; it seems to me that
there are strong reasons on both sides, and no obvious result. Better to
retain copyright and irrevocably grant to all recipients all the rights
you don't want to restrict.

-- 
 \       “Well, my brother says Hello. So, hooray for speech therapy.” |
  `\                                                      —Emo Philips |
_o__)                                                                  |
Ben Finney