[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: > Brian Thomas Sniffen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > >> Michael Poole <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: >> >>> I expect that if a contributor has an uncommon interpretation of the >>> license requirements, he should check. >> >> I suspect that few people think a GPL'd installer of Microsoft Word >> would be compliant with the GPL. That's a reasonable analogy, right? >> A hardcoded string, copied to some device which runs it, and maybe >> with some additional setup. > > The installer can be GPLed, sure. Why shouldn't it be? You will > likely run into other copyright issues because you do not have > permission to redistribute Microsoft Word like that, but it is > irrelevant to the GPLness of the installer.
But why do I have permission to distribute the GPL'd installer that way (let's say it incorporates Emacs for some reason)? This isn't mere aggregation -- it would be if the files were next to each other on a CD and otherwise unrelated, but it's clear that there are dependencies between them. >>> On top of that, one of the earliest places I can find that Richter >>> contributed code was in ... reworking the USB serial device support >>> (the very thing he complained infringed his copyrights). It makes me >>> wonder if he took debate lessons from debial-legal -- or vice versa. >> >> Your repeated insults to the people here are not convincing anyone. >> Do they help you reason better? If not, I suggest that they are >> counterproductive. > > They are calculated to try to get the people here to apply reasoning > rather than their usual patterns of assuming they are the governing > authority. They govern their own actions. The Debian developers here are reasonably well-respected by the actual authorities. > Andrew declined to back up his legal procedure claims and > misquoted me in a way he should have known I did agree with; Joe > rejected an analytical tool I suggested without offering a > replacement. In both cases it was after I suggested ways they could > further the debate in a way I thought would be productive. There is > only so far I will go to support rational argument when others refuse. > >> To put this in more concrete terms: the copyright holder for some of >> the code Debian distributes claims that his license is being >> violated. What do you suggest we do? It appears that you suggest we >> ignore him or tell him that his interpretation of copyright law is >> incorrect. That doesn't seem very nice. > > It is not his interpretation of copyright law, but his interpretation > of the license, that is incorrect. It's a unilateral license. It can't mean anything but what he intends it to mean. > Telling him that may not be nice, but nobody suggested the right way > to deal with SCO was being nice to them, either. If someone insists > that his copyright is being infringed, we should stop distributing > *his* code. It is not fair to other parties that his complaints > should cause the removal of their code. I think the UW is the right comparison, not SCO -- who are incorrect in their understanding of the law. But I, and others here, are persuaded by the arguments that non-free firmware in the kernel is unacceptable. I'm further persuaded by the arguments that GPL-incompatible firmware in the kernel is unacceptable, and a violation of the license under which Debian distributes most of the kernel source. I see code written to load that firmware specifically, with curlicues and features designed to work with that GPL-incompatible code. That says to be pretty strongly that the kernel containing the firmware is a derivative work of the firmware. Sure, you can clip the firmware out and use it separately, and that's not derivative of the kernel -- but I don't think that's important. I am prepared to be convinced otherwise, but, well, I'm a consequentialist. If your thesis guts the GPL, then your thesis is (pragmatically) wrong. Can I put a GPL-incompatible icon into Emacs, then, such that it's displayed by X as the minimized form? Or would that violate the GPL? Can I include a GPL-incompatible elisp script with Emacs? -Brian -- Brian Sniffen [EMAIL PROTECTED]
