On Mon, Aug 02, 1999 at 06:20:45PM +0200, Peter Makholm wrote: > I've packaged the international kernel patch for non-us but there is > some problems with the copyrights: > > Case 1: > +/* This is an independent implementation of the MARS encryption */ > +/* algorithm designed by a team at IBM as a candidate for the US */ > +/* NIST Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) effort. The algorithm */ > +/* is subject to Patent action by IBM, who intend to offer royalty */ > +/* free use if a Patent is granted. */ > > This is OK to put into non-us/main. Not because free use is granted > but because we don't care about us-patent rules in non-us.
If the patent affects anybody, it goes into non-free. This means that if China grants M$ a patent for kernels, linux becomes non-free as far as the our current policies are concerned. Now when several people tell me that's not so I'm going to immediately ask why then do US patents mætter? What's the difference between a patent in the US and in China? Or Russia? Or South Africa? Hell, the way policy is currently worded anyplace that makes software legally difficult to distribute makes it non-free. I tried to change this but too many people had issues with changing it. I do NOT like the current policy. It's hypocritical and unreasonable. It also ties free software to things that are beyond the author's control and is a senseless handicap we have placed on ourselves that nobody else is doing even though they don't have an infrastructure to legally work around it. OTOH we _DO_ have an infrastructure to work around it and we won't.. Outside the US, GIFs are perfectly free. Even RMS thinks so. But in the US the LZW patent makes them non-free. And yet we have gif tools in non-free because of the stupidity of the US government even though pandora can distribute them in main, where they belong as far as the rest of the world is concerned. Granted mp3 and idea are a little harder because they're patented in more places, but we're not even talking about how to resolve the problem anymore. The closest we've come was talking about marking non-free package somehow with our opinions of why we think it fails to meet the DFSG and someone suggested that it could be used also for export controls and patents.. That's as far as it got. =< -- Joseph Carter <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Debian GNU/Linux developer GnuPG: 2048g/3F9C2A43 - 20F6 2261 F185 7A3E 79FC 44F9 8FF7 D7A3 DCF9 DAB3 PGP 2.6: 2048R/50BDA0ED - E8 D6 84 81 E3 A8 BB 77 8E E2 29 96 C9 44 5F BE -------------------------------------------------------------------------- While the year 2000 (y2k) problem is not an issue for us, all Linux implementations will impacted by the year 2038 (y2.038k) issue. The Debian Project is committed to working with the industry on this issue and we will have our full plans and strategy posted by the first quarter of 2020.
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