At the risk of seeming to pick nits, this is not actually the effect of the GPL. The author of a GPL work can license it to different parties on different terms; only authors of derivative works are so encumbered. The author of a GPL work could even sell it, or add conditions of sale, such as allowing people to purchase technical support only if they also purchased the program. The author of a GPL could even make two completely different versions such as a free version and a pay version; nothing in the GPL prohibits crippleware by an original author.
-- Mike On 2000-05-19 at 22:27 -0400, Raul Miller wrote: > However, the GPL tries to make sure that -- once copies of GPLed software > are distributed -- the recipients of the software have as many rights as > any other recipients of any other versions of that software. [That means > no peculiar rules about how recipient c has to follow special procedures > when modifying the version of the software received from recipient f, > for instance.]
