On Mon, Nov 19, 2012 at 01:06:17PM -0500, Rich Freeman wrote: > On Mon, Nov 19, 2012 at 12:06 PM, Greg KH <gre...@gentoo.org> wrote: > > On Mon, Nov 19, 2012 at 07:03:12AM -0500, Rich Freeman wrote: > >> That's my main concern here. Can somebody say, "sure, go ahead and > >> remove my name from the copyright line" and then sue you for doing it? > > > > Just removing the name doesn't remove the copyright itself, but, and > > this is the important thing, it shows "intent". Intent is a very > > powerful thing when it comes to legal enforcement. If you remove a > > copyright line, or add your own line, you are showing what you are > > wanting to do here. > > > > So if you remove a copyright line, you are showing your "intent" to > > remove the legal notification of the original copyright holders of the > > file, which, in numerous juristictions, can be a very serious offence. > > > > Again, talk to a lawyer for all of the details if you are curious. > > So, I give you a file. Then I tell you IN WRITING that you can go > ahead and remove my name from the copyright line if you want to. > > I think it would be hard for me to argue that I should be able to > obtain damages when I gave you authorization to remove my name.
You obviously are trying to apply "logic" to laws. That can not always be done, sorry, you should know better :) Again, if you want details, talk to a copyright lawyer. You aren't taking my word for it, so I'm not going to try to argue the point any further. > That said, I'd be happy to chat with a lawyer about this, and if you > know of any who wouldn't mind having such a conversation free of > charge, let me know, or feel free to point them to the list. Lawyers that work free-of-charge are rare, but the SFLC has some that might be able to help out. Again, the Foundation should be doing this, and set up the proper guidelines/rules that we all follow, and then these discussions will not need to happen. thanks, greg k-h
