Bradley M. Kuhn wrote:
>
>Ben Tilly wrote:
>
> > My statement several times now is that I don't care what you do if you
> > don't call it perl, and I have even given examples (oraperl and perlex)
>of
> > people who did exactly that.
>
> > The only concern is if you call it perl (embrace), it is not perl
> > (extend), and your goal is to confuse people about what perl is
> > (extinguish). Go look at what Microsoft tried with Kerberos and Java if
> > you have any questions about what it is that I object to.
>
>I understand Ben's point here, and I think it's a good one. It would be
>useful to make sure that we can thwart efforts to "embrace and extend"
>Perl.
In fact when I read the AL I see the intent as being to give
this protection, and protect from implicit warranty. All else
is allowed.
>However, ensuring that "Perl is always Perl", and that someone doesn't
>"embrace and extend" is difficult thing to do with copyright law, if not
>impossible. Thus, I don't think trying to do it with a copyright license,
>such as the Artistic License, is the best approach.
I agree that having a copyright protect from any possibility
of forking would be counter-productive. However I am of the
belief that as long as the issue remains only one of having
the community on your side, Larry Wall has no need to worry
about the possibility of someone sucessfully maintaining a
fork.
Legal games are another story. But in a fair competition (ie
both of you can use what the other guy did) Larry is golden.
>I believe this problem is actually best solved by putting a trademark on
>the
>word "Perl". Then, the trademark license would say, in legal-eze: "You
>can't use the name 'Perl' in the name of your product unless it includes
>the
>unmodified implementation of perl".
>
The best protection in the legal arena is indeed trademarks.
However using a trademark requires constant defence, which
in turn requires challenging anyone who markets some
variation on Perl (eg mod_perl, oraperl, perlex) to force
them to mention your trademark.
I don't think that fits with the Perl community very well.
Nor would most of the people who like the AL want to go through
that work. So even though the protection from copyright may be
incomplete, I think it is a better fit than trademarks.
>
>For verification, I think this is an excellent question to pose to a
>lawyer:
>
> "What is the best way to ensure that if a company or other entity calls
> something Perl, that it is definitely Perl as we know it. Should we
>try
> to do it in a copyright license, or is trademark law a better
>approach?"
The answer is going to be trademark. That is what trademark is
meant for. But ask this question:
What is the best way to both give Larry some comfort
that he can retain control over what most people think
of as Perl, while allowing him to think as little as
possible about lawyers and litigation?
I think the answer will change. :-)
>I will try to run this by Eben, if I can get some of his cycles (he is
>helping pro-bono, so this might be hard). If anyone else has some lawyer
>friends who are willing to help, that'd be great.
Karsten pointed out to me that [EMAIL PROTECTED]
is an active list that contains a number of legal types who
would likely be interested. I am not on that list, nor do
I think this discussion should be carried out there, but I
think it would be good if someone mentions this list and
discussion there and see who nibbles.
Cheers,
Ben
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