On Sun, 2003-03-02 at 20:11, Branden Robinson wrote: > ... if > I change GNU coreutils to have every program "normally" output a > copyright notice and disclaimer of warranty, no one who receives my > my modified version (whether directly from me or not, and whether it > includes further modifications or not) can ever remove the copyright > notice and disclaimer of warranty without making the program > non-interactive, which might be pretty difficult if we are as creative > with our definition of "interactive" as Mr. Turner appears to be. If I > modify GNU coreutils in other ways, so as to include copyrightable > modifications of my own, then even the FSF cannot accept my > modifications without retaining the copyright notice and warranty > disclaimer banner, because my own copyright will have to be in the > notice, and they have no right to remove it. If they want the > functionality I have written *and* to get rid of the banner, they have > to convince me to assign my copyright to them, or re-implement my > modifications.
Actually, I think "Copyright 2003, FSF and others (see file /foo/bar for details) [no warranty]" would be an appropriate copyright notice. So, there's a minor problem, but not an unbounded problem. I'm just not sure I see an actual case when this would happen. One issue would be that any shell scripts relying on the output of the programs would have to be changed. This would be enough work to disuade any but the most determined from making this change. In cases other than coreutils, where far fewer shell scripts rely on output, the problem for everyone else is much smaller too. Even if there is a problem, it's not even on the order of the BSD advertising clause -- it doesn't make the software non-free. And if there is a problem, it's a genuine problem which ought to be fixed. -- -Dave Turner Stalk Me: 617 441 0668 "On matters of style, swim with the current, on matters of principle, stand like a rock." -Thomas Jefferson
