> On Tue, Oct 16, 2012 at 13:22, Carson Chittom wrote:
> > This is pretty minor, but:
> >
> > 1. I just noticed that both grdc.c and grdc.6 (in src/games/grdc)
> > say "Copyright 2002 Amos Shapir. Public domain." The US
> > Copyright Office says[1], essentially, that copyright and public
> > domain are mutually exclusive categories.
> >
> > 2. I found a message from Theo in the archives from 2003[2] listing
> > grdc as one of the items of which the license was clarified
> > during an audit.
>
> In this case, the text is somewhat misleading, but means Amos wrote
> it, but presumably disavowed the copyright that was once held.
This is the commit:
----------------------------
revision 1.12
date: 2002/07/26 20:32:38; author: pjanzen; state: Exp; lines: +4 -1
The elusive original author of this program and man page surfaced long enough
to state the following, when asked about licensing issues:
"It's ok to put any copyright as long as it stays in the public domain.
...
Since I did not write it to make any profit or fame in the first place,
I guess its use is not limited by any license. Of course I would not
object to my name being mentioned."
Then he disappeared again.
So I've put on a current copyright to him, and labelled the code explicitly
as public domain.
----------------------------
A bit of confusion regarding public domain and copyright obviously
happened here, however the author's intent is clear in the mail to
Paul Janzen.
I accept that this file is free enough.
> > 3. I vaguely remember that it may not be possible to place
> > something in the public domain in some countries.
Wow, what's that got to do with anything?
> We don't care about that. I suppose people in such countries would
> not be able to contribute public domain code, but that's their problem,
> not ours.
I think it is a bunch of bullshit. Many of those countries follow the
original idea behind copyright, which is to require that the wishes
and rights of the author of a work be respected in all ways. It is
ridiculous to believe that his wishes and rights are being respected
if he wants to completely release the work completely. The people in
those countries who make this claim probably have nice houses and
cars. In any case, it is not my problem if people in those country
let those people run over their rights in that way.
