On Friday 29 March 2013 15:58:57 Cowboy wrote: > So they ( sorta ) say, but FSF claims copyright on anything licensed GPL. > I have a bit of a problem with that meself, regardless of their > implied motivation.
This is just not so from all I understand. Anything I license under the GPL is still mine. The FSF does not hold the copyrights on it. How to use GNU licenses for your own software http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-howto.html "Whichever license you plan to use, the process involves adding two elements to each source file of your program: a copyright notice (such as “Copyright 1999 Terry Jones”), and a statement of copying permission, saying that the program is distributed under the terms of the GNU General Public License (or the Lesser GPL)." In my case it would be: "Copyright 2013 drew Roberts." That is it. I still have the copyrights to my original software and can do what I like with it. At this point, I am the one responsible for enforcing copyright violations, including GPL license violations with respect to my original software. Now, if I want my software to be "Official GNU Software" as opposed to simple Free Software under the GPL, the situation is different. GNU Software Evaluation http://www.gnu.org/help/evaluation.html As I understand it, at that point, they want you to assign copyrights to the FSF and agree to work within their guidelines in a good number of areas. (I am not seeing that spelled out in my reading this morning but that is how I have understood it as a result of past reading and discussions.) 6.1 Copyright Papers http://www.gnu.org/prep/maintain/html_node/Copyright-Papers.html#Copyright-Papers So, at this point, the FSF would handle copyright violations and license violations. (pretty much the same thing.) Depending on your aims, you can also seek to have your project become a client of the Software Freedom Law Center http://www.softwarefreedom.org/services/ If you are an SFLC client, they enforce your US copyrights and coordinate international enforcement in your works that they represent. (Check the exact wording on their site in case I miss state something here.) Now, if my software is not original but incorporates or is a fork of GNU software of other software covered but the GPL, but significantly not the LGPL, then I have to use the GPL for the license on my software but I still won the copyrights to my software and have to enforce violations unless as above. IANAL, TINLA, etc. all the best, drew _______________________________________________ Rivendell-dev mailing list [email protected] http://lists.rivendellaudio.org/mailman/listinfo/rivendell-dev
