Paul Lussier said:
>
>In a message dated: Thu, 31 May 2001 00:38:29 EDT
>[EMAIL PROTECTED] said:
>
>>If you are the sole author of a piece of code it's yours to license
>>under whatever terms suit you. You can even offer different licenses
>>to different consumers.
>>
>>Once a particular release has been licensed to at least one consumer
>>under the GPL, the code in that release is Free. All of the "viral"
>>business applies to downstream developers. There is nothing in the
>>license that forces the original author to make subsequent or parallel
>>releases Free, provided that no contributions have been accepted from
>>outside the owning entity.
>
>Right, but I write some piece of software, say it's 100 sloc, and I
>release it under the GPL. If I then add 2 more lines to that first
>100, isn't that considered a derivative work, and therefore also
>considered free under the GPL?
Nope, because you are the original author. GPL ONLY applies to downstream.
>
>Sure, I could use that first 100 sloc in something, then only release
>compiled binaries under a different license, and maybe no one would
>notice (or more likely, no one would care). However, I would expect
>that to be covered by the GPL. The fact that I am the original
>and maybe sole author of the code seems to be irrelevant. The fact
>is, the code *was* released under the GPL, the next generation of
>software used code *covered* by the GPL, and therefore, it seems this
>release should *also* be covered.
If you're the original author, you can release under as many licenses as
you want (GPL, BSD, Artistic, X, commercial, etc). That's what Trolltech
is doing with QT (releasing under commercial, QT, and GPL licenses
simultaneiously).
>
>As sole author of the code, I suppose I could say "Okay, no future
>release is covered by the GPL!". However, wouldn't that preclude
>even me from using the previous code in a non-free way?
>
>Seems that way.
>
Nope. Original author is NOT bound by the GPL. Think of the GPL as a contract. It's
between 2 parties. Cambell's Soup can offer that can of tomato soup to one grocery
store with one price, to another at another price, etc. They can change the price on
future cans as they want. They can't raise the price of the cans they've already sold.
You're not two parties (although I have been of two minds about some things ;-).
jeff
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Jeffry Smith Technical Sales Consultant Mission Critical Linux
[EMAIL PROTECTED] phone:603.930.9739 fax:978.446.9470
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Thought for today: Guido /gwee'do/ or /khwee'do/
Without qualification,
Guido van Rossum (author of Python). Note that Guido answers to
English /gwee'do/ but in Dutch it's /khwee'do/.
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