> > Developing and releasing software under the GPL will ensure that nobody > will be able to ever take your software and make it proprietary.
So will not releasing it as open source in the first place. > If > that's what you want, you should release under the GPL. ... or not release it as open source at all. Copyrighting, trade-marking, patenting and licensing it will give you additional rights and protections against someone else using your code to make a buck for themselves or claim it as their own. GPL only makes sense when you intend for the software to serve a "higher purpose" and want to make sure no one uses it with "bad motives". Personally when I decide to release something as open source, I do it with in the spirit of "freely you have received, freely give." That is, I have other motives for releasing it than making money, and officially don't care if someone else decides to use it in their own proprietary software or make a buck. More power to them. When I need to pay the mortgage and my kids college debt, I tend to avoid releasing it as open source, and any use of OS/free software in my product involves non-GPL OS licenses only. > Using GPL software means you are bound not to take pieces of it and > make > it proprietary. If you are fine with that limitation, go ahead and use > GPL software. > > I use GPL software all the time. Linux, most of the shell and > filesystem > utilities, and a ton of high-quality free software is GPL licensed. I > have no qualms with this. > > When looking for libraries to include in my software, however, I'm very > careful to avoid GPL software if at all possible. Wise move! > If not possible, it > just doesn't get bundled in with my distribution but instead becomes a > prerequisite for a certain feature set (end-user must download and > install). I haven't changed it or derived from it. > > So, yes, you must understand the licensing implications of the various > flavors of "open source". Yep. I think many people think of "open source" as a monolithic thing and it certainly is not that. - Bob > > Paul _______________________________________________ Post Messages to: [email protected] Subscription Maintenance: http://leafe.com/mailman/listinfo/profox OT-free version of this list: http://leafe.com/mailman/listinfo/profoxtech Searchable Archive: http://leafe.com/archives/search/profox This message: http://leafe.com/archives/byMID/profox/[EMAIL PROTECTED] ** All postings, unless explicitly stated otherwise, are the opinions of the author, and do not constitute legal or medical advice. This statement is added to the messages for those lawyers who are too stupid to see the obvious.
