Miriam Ruiz <mir...@debian.org> writes: > So in my opinion, if you modify a code which was released under GPL2+ > and you license your modifications as GPL3+, the resulting work has to > also be GPL, and the terms or conditions that apply are those of the > version 3 of the lincense, or later, but you're not effectively > relicensing the code that is not yours, so that part would be still > licensed as GPL2+ by the author and copyright holder.
I may give to others the permission to use the modified/redistributed file under GPL-3+. This permission is what is usually called "License". In that sense, the license is changed. > So if you later removed the part of code that was covered by a > different license, the resulting code would be still under the > original license, The license is usually granted to a file as a whole, not to specific lines. If got got a changed file from me, and you revert my changes, then you are still bound to the conditions that we agreed about when you got the file -- these conditions are the "license". If we agreed on GPL-3, then you are bound to GPL-3. > because you were never the copyright holder, and you never had > permission to relicense it. I seriously doubt that any judge would > rule otherwise. Just again this example: http://www.opensource.apple.com/source/xnu/xnu-1456.1.26/bsd/sys/msg.h This is a file that is initially copyrighted by Daniel Boulet (and licensed under BSD-2-Clause). However, without any other change, it also has the header | Copyright (c) 2000-2007 Apple Inc. All rights reserved. | [...] | This file contains Original Code and/or Modifications of Original Code | as defined in and that are subject to the Apple Public Source License | Version 2.0 (the 'License'). You may not use this file except [...] So, Apple puts another license to this file, probably without having the permission of Daniel Boulet. Would you accept such a file in Debian? It is clearly not BSD-licensed, even if an unchanged BSD-licensed version exists. When trusting the Apple Lawyers a bit, then this contradicts your argumentation. Best regards Ole -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-legal-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: https://lists.debian.org/87pp5je701....@debian.org
