Bug#690495: Bug#689095: [debian-policy] Prohibit click-through licenses or disclaimers
On Mon, Oct 15, 2012 at 01:08:01AM +0200, Leo 'costela' Antunes wrote:
> Josh, next time please keep me CC on such emails to avoid uncoordinated
> work. I hadn't seen this and also wrote -legal for insight (and CCd
> you), which might be a bit redundant.
Sorry about that; I did indeed intend to CC you on the mail, but
apparently I forgot to do so before sending it.
> On 15/10/12 00:23, Jonathan Nieder wrote:
> > I think we can justify this under the grounds that if a large portion
> > of the archive starts to imitate this feature of Transmission then it
> > would lead to a poor user experience.
Agreed.
> That being said: IANAL, but I personally don't believe this sort of
> click-through disclaimer does any good. It's just that this sort of
> "what-if" argument doesn't seem strong enough for a case where upstream
> believes it has legitimate grounds for worrying.
On the other hand, upstream might just intend it as a warning for the
benefit of users, rather than just a means of reducing liability for the
developers. In that case, it need not consist of a click-through to
have some useful benefit.
> > Perhaps it would be possible to put the
> > disclaimer in the main window when there are no downloads running, so
> > users would have an opportunity to learn about what the law permits
> > that way.
That seems like a good idea to me, and unobtrusive. The only problem I
see: many users will launch Transmission for the first time when they
click on a torrent link in a web browser or file manager, which will
launch Transmission and immediately pop up the dialog to start a
torrent; once the user starts that torrent, the disclaimer wouldn't
display. However, what about a disclaimer sitting below the last
torrent, always at the bottom of the list?
- Josh Triplett
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