On Thu, Oct 18, 2012 at 5:32 PM, Bradley M. Kuhn <[email protected]> wrote: > Felipe Contreras wrote at 06:26 (PDT) on Wednesday: >> It doesn't matter how the GPL was designed, the GPL doesn't have >> precedence over the law, and the law doesn't allow a software license >> to change the nature of copyright law. > > The GPL *doesn't* change the nature of copyright law. It uses copyright > law to uphold principles. Most Free Software developers I know don't > accept copyright law, as applied to software, as necessarily the > absolute best moral policy for software just because "it exists". In > fact, I, like most copyleft advocates, find that copyright law, as it's > usually applied to software, actually harms users and developers. I > also don't believe we should accept a system as morally correct merely > because it exists. Copyleft uses copyright law to implement a different > moral policy: that's the famous hack of copyleft itself.
Yes, yes, what *you* believe is crystal clear, that's only what *you* believe, and we are not talking about what *you* believe, we are talking about *reality*. If *you* are right, copyright law will eventually evolve, or disappear, but *you* might be wrong. We don't know that. What we know is the *reality* of today, and today copyright law protects the developers, not the users. Period. The rest of society is not bound to *your* beliefs, I you can't accept that this is only *your* opinion, and not a fact, or a law that society must follow; just a mere opinion, then there's no point in discussing any more. >> And I believe differently, and so do a lot of people, which is why we >> have the law that we have. > > There are many historians and researchers who believe we have the > copyright law we have mainly because the law has not properly adapted > from the age of the printing press to the digital age. Indeed, in many > ways it's akin to other types of laws that seemed to make sense at the > time they were first created, but today aren't so much. Yes, so what? Copyright law can evolve to the needs of today, but it would still protect the developers, no the users. The argument "historians say copyright law has not properly adapted, therefore copyright law must change to fit my opinions" is a non-sequitur. >> I believe I've said to you all I can say, but it still looks like you >> think the desires of certain people have precedence over the law, > > I never said any such thing. You've obviously misunderstood something I > said if you believe I'm saying that. Great, so can you stop repeating your opinions and desires over and over, and agree that copyright law protects the developers, not the users? >> [you think] that the _intent_ of the GPL is what matters, where in >> fact, what matters is what the law allows > > You're conflating issues. The intent of the GPL *does* matter in > explaining why some copyright holders disagree with you and chose to > enforce the GPL to maximum level that copyright law allows. What _they_ do is their own private mater, what _I_ do is different. I can choose to use the GPL in ways that the FSF never intended. In a court of law what the FSF intended is irrelevant, what is relevant is what is written in paper; bot in the law, and in the license. Opinions, desires, and intents are irrelevant. >> Therefore, users have no rights, they have privileges, and developers >> that don't enforce the GPLv2, are not eroding the rights. > > I'd say it this way: "Users should have an inalienable right to copy, > modify, and redistribute software. Sadly, no law gives users these > rights by default, but fortunately, some enlightened copyright holders > chose to use a copyleft license which uses the legal infrastructure that > exists (copyright law) to de-facto create those rights for users. Those > copyright holders furthermore often chose to enforce their copyrights so > as to ensure those users have the rights that the law doesn't otherwise > give them". IOW; developers give their users a privilege, not a right. >> That is the case *right now*, > > What I said is the case right now too. Note that *both* your statement > and mine mix fact and opinion together, and therefore ... My statement is not an opinion. I'm not talking about how things should be, I'm talking about how things are. And right now, I can go against the wishes of my users and grant a software company a license to use my code without contributing back, irregardless of what my users want. That's a *fact*. >> I wish you could agree on that. > > ... neither of us will likely agree with the other. > > For my part, I don't wish you would agree with me. I wish you'd accept > that copyright holders who enforce GPL are acting within their legal > rights to enforce the license, even if you don't like that they do. You > talk a lot about developer's legal rights under copyright law, but you > are also very critical of those who chose to use those legal rights to > the maximum with the goal of helping out their users. No, that's not the case at all. It's perfectly fine for developers to enforce the license of *their* code, that is enforced by copyright law, I *never* said otherwise. But developers shouldn't weigh on the code of other developers in the project, or even other projects. -- Felipe Contreras _______________________________________________ busybox mailing list [email protected] http://lists.busybox.net/mailman/listinfo/busybox
