Quoting Christopher Sean Morrison via License-discuss (license-discuss@lists.opensource.org):
> Code under an Open Source license that is not publicly available might > as well not be. Objection: Thorsten didn't speak of code that lacks public availability. > If it’s not publicly available and discoverable, I’m not sure I’d care > or consider them a qualifying use (for purposes of being considered a > license in use). Objection: Thorsten didn't say undiscoverable. Let us consider a specific example. I have a number of pages in my Linuxmafia.com Knowledgebase that originated long ago as vehicles for what I call 'non-rhetoric rhetoric', pages I created as handy links to post to demolish dumb frequently-observed debate points. Around 2002, we frequently heard 'There aren't enough mail client programs for Linux', so I figured the most hilarious and effective way to blow that up was to dispassionately and concisely list what's available. The answer at last count was: 122 mail client programs. During the 2000s, I was distressed to see that a particularly meritorious (IMO) graphical mail client called Post Office by Pim van Riezen was about to vanish off the Internet after van Riezen ceased development. It was/is GNU LGPL, so I rehosted the last source code release and beta snapshot source from 2003 onto my Web server in http://linuxmafia.com/pub/linux/apps/postoffice/ . Now, I submit that this nice little codebase is _not_ a case of 'might as well not be available', even if my mirror is by no means a usual place to look. Someone interested in reviving development and Web-searching on the program name and the author's name is going to find it on the first page of results. Post Office would be an example of a codebase -- admittedly in its case a dusty but not at all hopeless one -- that would fall through the cracks of conventional, commonly suggested methods of auditing OSI Certified licence usage. Which I take to be an example of Thorsten's point. _______________________________________________ License-discuss mailing list License-discuss@lists.opensource.org http://lists.opensource.org/mailman/listinfo/license-discuss_lists.opensource.org
