On Wed, Jan 19, 2005 at 12:01:48PM -0800, Michael K. Edwards wrote: > The end being achieved is a major factor in finding a "functional > interface" for legal purposes.
We're in violent agreement, here. > The GPL is indeed an offer of contract, but it ties standards of breach > so closely to copyright infringement that there isn't much room to > argue that non-infringing use still breaches the GPL. True, but the distinction between what's infringing and what's not is ... sometimes subject to debate. Anyways, as I understand it, the GPL was inspired by a case where the author of a program (who just happened to be RMS) was not allowed to read modified copies of his own work unless he signed a legal agreement which limited his right to further distribute his work. As a mechanism for releasing software for public use without exposing authors to these kinds of risks (and, thus, encouraging increased computer literacy), I think the GPL does a pretty good job. > Canadian case law seems to be similar, and Canadian courts make > careful use of US precedents in this area (such as the "abstraction - > filtration - comparison" test of Computer Associates v. Altai). I'd > be surprised if US and Canadian appeals courts were to reach seriously > divergent conclusions on facts similar to, say, MySQL v. Progress > Software. The parties settled out of court. In essence, the only thing the judge decided was that the issues worth taking to trial. Given the lack of precident, that's hardly a surprising decision. So, yeah, a Canadian judge would likely decide the same way... but the significant thing this says about the GPL is that it's something new. -- Raul -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
