While filing a bug on the non-free essays included with emacs21 (bug
#207932), I came across the file etc/termcap.src, which includes the
following disquieting text:
# COPYRIGHTS AND OTHER DELUSIONS
#
# The BSD ancestor of this file had a standard Regents of the University of
# California copyright with dates from 1980 to 1993.
#
# Some information has been merged in from a terminfo file SCO distributes.
# It has an obnoxious boilerplate copyright which I'm ignoring because they
# took so much of the content from the ancestral BSD versions of this file
# and didn't attribute it, thereby violating the BSD Regents' copyright.
#
# Not that anyone should care. However many valid functions copyrights may
# serve, putting one on a termcap/terminfo file with hundreds of anonymous
# contributors makes about as much sense as copyrighting a wall-full of
# graffiti -- it's legally dubious, ethically bogus, and patently ridiculous.
#
# This file deliberately has no copyright. It belongs to no one and everyone.
# If you claim you own it, you will merely succeed in looking like a fool.
# Use it as you like. Use it at your own risk. Copy and redistribute freely.
# There are no guarantees anywhere. Svaha!
#
This cavalier attitude seems rather dangerous. Is this file at all
used anymore? Is there any action necessary?
Peace,
Dylan Thurston
