Jambunathan K writes: > Bastien <b...@gnu.org> writes: > >> And it does not take too big a brain to understand why: if people >> were allowed to retract their assignment when they want for changes >> that have been published, the copyright assignment process would >> undermine the whole purpose of the GPL license, which is to make >> it possible to let *others* contribute to free code. > > As a maintainer of GNU project, I expect that you should have a basic > understanding of the purpose of the copyright assignment and GPL > license. From what I read above, I am not convinced that you have the > right understanding. Your articulation is clearly confusing and falling > short.
As a former teacher of copyright law (University of Sydney), I think that Bastien displays a very clear understanding of the effects of copyright assignment. Your understanding is less than clear. Bastien gets a "Distinction" in my class. You do not. Of course, I know that you will think that I am confused. Bastien, thanks for your patience and help during your time in the hotseat. You've done a marvelous job. > > See > > http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html#AssignCopyright > > You assign copyright to FSF so that you don't have to enforce GPL. By > assigning, one outsources the legal work of actual enforcing to FSF. > Single holder of rights just makes the legal procedures lot more easy. > > A contract that cannot be enforced is worthless. A license that you > cannot enforce is equally so. > > FSF says, assign me the rights, I will go after all the violators and > force them to comply with GPL. > > Jambunathan K. -- Alan L Tyree http://www2.austlii.edu.au/~alan Tel: 04 2748 6206 sip:172...@iptel.org