Hi Linus,
On Thu, 2007-11-08 at 07:30 +0100, Linus Tolke wrote:
I don't think we need the legal advice up front. If we can come to an
agreement on what we want to achieve with the license, it is a lot easier to
get the legal counceling on how to get there.
A variety of opinions have been expressed on what license people want and
the problems some people see with
the current license. Linus, I think you have already heard enough to have
pretty good idea of the wishes and concerns of the community.
I don't think continued discussion on this matter will be very productive,
particularly when a lot of it is based on legal assumptions
that may be faulty. We need to test some of the assumptions expressed in
this mailing list. The sooner, the better.
Afterward, we can make a much more informed decision.
For example, I think we need some clarification on issues such as:
- What exactly does ArgoUML need to do to change its license from BSD to
(EPL, LGPL, GPL)?
- What are the comparatives advantages and disadvantages of these
licenses. Good attorneys
can and should give not only legal interpretation, but practical
advice based on experience and
recent history.
- There are many wishes and desires that have been expressed in this
forum. Not all of them may be reconcilable.
We need to understand what objectives are not reconcilable, or
easily reconcilable, so we can start prioritizing our objectives.
In my experience, a good attorney is good at asking the right questions to
help the client understand what they really want to achieve.
I would speculate that one the outcomes of an initial discussion with the
SFLC would be a set of clarifying questions for the community to consider
before any further discussions with legal counsel.
Having a community discussion, after our "lay" interpretations of the law
have been tested, would be progress.
Having a better informed community discussing a set of questions prepared by
an attorney, designed to extract
our highest goals and objectives, would be progress.
I don't see any signs of progress in the current discussion.
If we don't get legal counsel soon, I am very concerned that one of two
things will happen:
1) The discussion will continue on for a while, like it has many times
before, with a lot of venting but with no concrete result, eventually
petering out
as people get distracted by pressing technical issues.
2) We actually do come to a decision, but we will have made it without
understanding of all the options that are available to us.
Voting for a license now before consulting an software IP attorney seems
like an ill person choosing a drastic medical treatment before consulting a
medical specialist.
Collectively, we are very intelligent community. But lets not deceive
ourselves into thinking we understand all the legal options available to us.
cheers,
roy
/Linus
2007/11/7, Roy Feldman <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
Hi Linus, Tom, and others,
On Tue, 2007-11-06 at 13:26 -0500, Tom Morris wrote:
> > ArgoUML could switch to the GPL v2 now, and announce that it will consider
> > requests for a different license. This would allow any serious large
> > companies to approach ArgoUML to do extensions.
That suggestion was from Roy, not me. I was pointing out why it
doesn't work from a practical point of view.
Please forget about anything else I have said on the issue of ArgoUML
licensing other than this:
The ArgoUML project should take advantage of being a member of the Software
Conservancy and
seek professional legal advice on what its legal options are for modifying
its software license.
If someone is a qualified attorney in the field of intellectual property law
on this mailing list, they
should identify themselves. Perhaps they may choose to contribute their time
along with the attorneys
at the Software Freedom Law Center.
After we have a professional opinion on what the legal options are for
ArgoUML, then we
can have a productive discussion about what license best meets the wishes of
the ArgoUML
community. In other words, a discussion that might lead to some meaningful
action.
cheers,
roy �
