Scripsit Glenn Maynard <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > On Wed, May 15, 2002 at 12:23:38PM -0500, Branden Robinson wrote:
> > In short, *any* addition or subtraction to the license terms of the GPL > > made by an author is an act of "dual-licensing". A copyright holder > > can, of course, cease distributing a work under the terms of the GNU GPL > > if that is incompatible with a larger licensing strategy. > Does this apply to the software at > where the author puts the software under the GPL, and then (separately) > says: > "Whenever a specific copyright notice conflicts with the GNU General > Public License, the specific copyright provision(s) will take precedence > over the GNU General Public License. One supposes so. However, if those "specific copyright notices" give *less* rights than the GPL, the whole thing is inconsistently licensed, and probably illegal to distribute at all. > (This program has a larger problem: many source files start with the text > // JFC Copyright (C) Glenn Rosenthal, 1999,2000,2001. // > // All rights reserved. // > which is contradictory, but that's a different issue.) Not really. If I'm correctly informed, the "All rights reserved" is a magic incantation that once was requred for *claiming* copyright (some say it still is, under the Pan-American Copyright Treaty which supposedly has signees who haven't signed the Berne Convention. But I haven't checked). Once you have reserved all your rights, you are in possession of a copyright which you can *then* use to put the softare under GPL. It is true that "Copyright N.N., all rights reserved" *by itself* is equivalent to no license, but that is because it *is* no licence, and therefore it cannot conflict with another statement by the same author that GPL applies. -- Henning Makholm "og de står om nissen Teddy Ring." -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
