On Sat, Feb 02, 2002 at 10:00:23PM -0800, Mark Bigler wrote: > On Saturday 02 February 2002 20:18, Jacob Meuser wrote: > > <snip> [lot's of good commentary on Linux vs BSD development] > > That's a pretty sweet analysis. It definitely took me up short.
I don't claim to be a historian or sociologist, but I do find them to be interesting subjects. > Social dynamics may very well account for much of what is often > attributed solely to the power of the license chosen for a project. RMS does a good job, eh? > With the L/GPL, RMS created two valuable tools for controlling publicly > released work. He filled a gap in the spectrum of license choice and > turned copyright on its ear. But, it's good to be reminded that it is > important to know what it is you want to give when making your work > available to others. Blindly choosing a license may not let your work > do what you really hoped it would accomplish. (Is that vague enough or > what?) Most good advice is vague ;) > Cool. > > Do I have the following right? (Other than my way oversimplification > of the GPL and LGPL.) > > Public Domain - It belongs to everyone and you don't care if anyone > ever knows who you were. > > X11/BSD - Credit where credit is due, but otherwise go for it. Anyone > can further restrict the license on something they release or use it to > start something new, but the original is always available. > > LGPL - Anyone can use it however they like, but if they release code > (binary or source) that uses it, they must make the source for the > LGPL'd code available. And, if the released code (binary or source) > required changes to the LGPL code, they must make those changes public. > > GPL - If you make binaries available, you must provide the source, > including any changes you may have made to that source. If you release > something based on it, your source needs to be GPL'd as well. I think it's important to note that one may not charge a fee for the software except for "the physical act of transferring a copy" or "warranty protection" under the GPL or LGPL. So "anyone can use it however they like" is more than an oversimplification, it's wrong. > Ghostscript - You can see the source as soon as it's released, but you > can't release anything based on it until the next full point release is > available. At that time the older source is treated as GPL'd. > (Patches to fix bugs, submitted to the original authors, is welcome.) > > QPL - You can see the source and work on changes. You can release > patches to the source, but you can not distribute the source with those > patches already applied. If you send your patches to the original > author, they may be considered for inclusion in a future release. > > Closed Community Source - Everyone who has paid for the source can > share changes with everyone else who has paid for the source, but no > one else. > > Reference Source - Product source is included, but it's just between > you and the original author. > > MS Shared Source - You can look at it, but you can't change it. And, > even if you could change it, it wouldn't compile properly. Please let > MS know about any bug fixes you may have, even if you can't test them. > And, oh BTW, remember, just the fact that you could have looked at the > source means MS may have rights to any future code you write that is at > all similar. > > Closed Source - You've got what you've got, if we don't ever make a new > release, that's it. Also some licenses state that reverse engineering is forbidden. If you're interested in software copyright, here's a link to OpenBSD's take on the subject -> http://www.openbsd.org/policy.html -- <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
