Hi Paul, Forwarding your message on to debian-project, which is where project policies are discussed. On Fri, Sep 27, 2013 at 04:33:44PM -0500, Paul Elliott wrote: > Policy Statement > 1)Debian will not knowingly distribute software encumbered by > patents; Debian contributors should not package or distribute > software they know to infringe a patent. > 2)Debian will not accept a patent license that is inconsistent > with the Debian Social Contract or Debian Free Software > Guidelines. > 3)Unless communications related to patents are subject to > attorney-client privilege, community members may be forced to > produce them in a lawsuit. Also, patent concerns expressed > publicly may turn out to be unfounded but create a good deal > of fear, uncertainty, and doubt in the meantime. Therefore, > please refrain from posting patent concerns publicly or > discussing patents outside of communication with legal > counsel, where they are subject to attorney-client privilege. > This is very confusing. I have some ideas in my head that > I am thinking about patenting, but I only want to torture the > proprietary software people with it. I would certainly license all > free software and free software users. > But according to 1) that would not do any good, because 1) read > literally means that if software is patented at all and software > infringes on a claim, debian will have nothing to do with it. The key word here is "infringe". Reading on a patent is not the same thing as infringement; if a piece of software implements a patent, but we have a valid license for that patent, that's not infringement. > But 2) read conversely, implies that there could be a patent license > that debian will accept. Yes, it must be a patent license that conveys to all downstreams the same rights that Debian is granted, and that transfers when the user exercises their freedom to create a (free) derivative work. > After all, if debian accepted absolutely no patent licenses, the clause > about inconsistant with the DSC or DFSG would be unnecessary, and 2) > would read: > "Debian will accept no patent licenses." > So what would a patent license consistant with DSC and DFSG look like? > And what good would it do? 1) read literally means that if software > infringes on the claims of a patent debian would have nothing to > do with it, consistant license be damned. > It is all very confusing. > And 3 means I can't even ask anyone about this confusion. > Can anybody clarify? 3) says not. Hope that helps, -- Steve Langasek Give me a lever long enough and a Free OS Debian Developer to set it on, and I can move the world. Ubuntu Developer http://www.debian.org/ slangasek@ubuntu.com vorlon@debian.org
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