Manoj Srivastava wrote:
> On Tue, 30 Jan 2007 09:21:12 -0800, Kevin B McCarty
> <kmccarty@Princeton.EDU> said:
>> In addition to the question of possible license non-freeness raised
>> by others, I have some impression that wavelets are a patent
>> minefield. If this software was distributed by Debian, would we be
>> subject to possible patent enforcement issues? As a volunteer Free
>> Software project we have neither the money nor the desire to license
>> patents.
>
> This seems to fly in the face of the actual policy Debian has
> with regards to patents.
As far as I know Debian does not distribute software when patents
affecting it are being actively enforced. In the case of wavelet
transforms, it looks like at least one company (LizardTech) was trying
to do so until Jan. 2006:
http://www.patenthawk.com/blog/2005/10/wavlet_not_a_wave.html
http://www.iplitigationblog.com/patent-lawsuit-news-mr-bolt-speaks-his-mind.html
In this particular case the patent was ruled to be overly broad, so
perhaps Free software can safely use wavelet transforms now, but . I'm
absolutely no expert in the field, and before checking Google just now,
I originally had only a vague worry that patent troubles might exist.
So I apologize for bringing this up if patent enforcement on wavelet
transforms is no longer a concern.
> Additionally, your tone and constructs
> ("*we* have neither the desire...") imply that you are speaking on
> behalf of the project -- which, as a non-developer, it is unlikely
> that you can.
?
kevin-mccartys-computer:~ kmccarty$ gpg --list-keys 4F83C751
pub 1024D/4F83C751 2003-12-17
[snip]
uid Kevin B. McCarty <kmccarty@debian.org>
sub 1024g/3EFFD324 2003-12-17
I don't think I can speak on behalf of the project even as a developer.
(Should I add a disclaimer to my .sig to make sure everyone realizes
that?) I was making an observation about the Debian Project's lack of
either desire or funding to license patents. I'll be more careful with
my pronouns in the future...
best regards,
--
Kevin B. McCarty <kmccarty@princeton.edu> Physics Department
WWW: http://www.princeton.edu/~kmccarty/ Princeton University
GPG: public key ID 4F83C751 Princeton, NJ 08544
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