Re: upstream changing from GPL-2+ to GPL-3+ without copyright holders permission

[Andrej Shadura <andrew@shadura.me>]

Hi,

On Mon, 5 Aug 2019 at 14:38, Eriberto Mota <eriberto@debian.org> wrote:
> Hi folks,
>
> I have a basic doubt.
>
> A program called "test" was released by Bob over GPL-2+. This program
> got contributions from Ana and Chloe. The development was stopped some
> years later and, now, Ted want continue this development. However, Ted
> kept the name "test" and changed the licensing to GPL-3+ without a
> permission from previous copyright holders, that are inactive. Is
> possible do it, only considering the plus signal in previous licensing
> (GPL-2+)?

If the license statement says:

> This program is free software; you can redistribute it
> and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public
> License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either
> version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later
> version.

then it is totally fine to choose that option, since the copyright
holders have already given that permission you think they need to
give.

-- 
Cheers,
  Andrej