Re: BitTorrent 4.0.1 - BitTorrent Open Source License
Michael Janssen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > BitTorrent 4.0.1 changed the license from it's old version, 3.4.2 to > the BitTorrent Open Source License available at > http://www.bittorrent.com/license/. The license he uses is included > below. Is there a consensus between any of the debian-legal folks on > whether this license is DFSG-free? Probably not. I didn't see the copy of the licence he uses. The one on the web, I'm not happy about 4a, 4b is a practical problem, I think 4d is easy to abuse so every use needs checking carefully, 9b looks a little broad (but may be irrelevant) and 13 specifies a venue giving an effective termination clause opportunity. It's one to avoid if you can and watch very carefully if you can't. Also see the recent information from Josselin Mouette at http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2005/03/msg00581.html and coordinate efforts if you can. > [...] If it is not, bugs will most likely need to be filed against > jabber packages because this license is based on the Jabber Open Souce > License and, AFAICT, the same objected to sections exist in that > license. It looks like the intent is for the jabber package to be useful under GPL, but the implementation might not be perfect. A bug is open, number 302417 and we've seen one snippet on this list. http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2005/04/msg0.html -- MJR/slef My Opinion Only: see http://people.debian.org/~mjr/ Please follow http://www.uk.debian.org/MailingLists/#codeofconduct -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
BitTorrent 4.0.1 - BitTorrent Open Source License
BitTorrent 4.0.1 changed the license from it's old version, 3.4.2 to the BitTorrent Open Source License available at http://www.bittorrent.com/license/. The license he uses is included below. Is there a consensus between any of the debian-legal folks on whether this license is DFSG-free? There was some discussion of this license before[1], but there wasn't any real consensus of whether it is DFSG-free or not. There seemed to be some issue with the "keep code available 12 months", and the choice of venue. If it is not, bugs will most likely need to be filed against jabber packages because this license is based on the Jabber Open Souce License and, AFAICT, the same objected to sections exist in that license. 1. http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2005/03/msg00181.html -- Michael Janssen --- Jamuraa --- [EMAIL PROTECTED] --- [EMAIL PROTECTED] -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Draft summary of Creative Commons 2.0 licenses (version 3)
On Fri, Apr 01, 2005 at 12:16:54PM +0100, Matthew Garrett wrote: > Andrew Suffield <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > On Thu, Mar 31, 2005 at 06:26:22PM +0100, Matthew Garrett wrote: > > >> The same phrase appears in several other licenses that we consider free. > >> Your argument appears to be that we should consider those licenses > >> non-free because the words can be interpreted in a non-free manner. > > > > Whenever such licenses appear, we either get them fixed or explicitly > > clarified by the author. That is what we are trying to do here, > > despite the best efforts of some people to obstruct the process. > > No we don't. There's huge chunks of X under licenses like that without > us having obtained any clarification. I doubt the accuracy of that, but regardless, if there are, it's just because we haven't got around to them yet. > We assume that they're free unless > the copyright holder claims otherwise. You might like that to be > changed, but what you're claiming is simply untrue - current practice is > not to read licenses in the worst possible light. By your logic, current practice is not to fix RC bugs, because there exist RC bugs which have not been fixed. -- .''`. ** Debian GNU/Linux ** | Andrew Suffield : :' : http://www.debian.org/ | `. `' | `- -><- | signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: Linux and GPLv2
On Fri, 01 Apr 2005, Måns Rullgård wrote: > You are obviously convinced that using a command line interface > can't be protected by copyright. Why, then, are you so persistent in > insisting that other interfaces somehow are awarded such protection? Whether or not a specific interface is covered by copyright is necessarily jurisdictionally dependent. A conservative tack is to assume that if there's any creative component at all, then there is a possibility of copyright. [Even that may not go far enough, as some things that are devoid of creativity may have the protection of copyright in specific localities, cf. the database directive.] If you wish to say that there is no copyright protection for a specific instance in a specific jurisdiction, that may indeed be the case,[1] but it's quite irresponsible to claim that it is so for all jurisdictions. Don Armstrong 1: If it is so, I'd strongly suggest finding relevant case law or talking to a lawyer before using this to take actions which would be infringing if a copyright actually did exist. -- Quite the contrary; they *love* collateral damage. If they can make you miserable enough, maybe you'll stop using email entirely. Once enough people do that, then there'll be no legitimate reason left for anyone to run an SMTP server, and the spam problem will be solved. -- Craig Dickson in <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> http://www.donarmstrong.com http://rzlab.ucr.edu
Re: Linux and GPLv2
Raul Miller <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > On Thu, Mar 31, 2005 at 09:17:51PM +0200, Måns Rullgård wrote: >> Thanks for mentioning command lines. Running a program from the >> command line, usually involves passing it options. These options are >> (obviously) copies of strings from the actual program. Can this >> copying be a copyright violation? IMHO, it is no different, in >> principle, from using function names declared in a header file. > > If you can find us a country whose laws make this illegal, > this issue would be worth discussing. > > If the laws of that country were available in english, we > could probably do justice to that (hypothetical) discussion. > > If there are any such countries, and they make a practice > of enforcing such laws (rather than just having them on the > books to confuse novices), we should probably put together a > page warning people to about using computers in that country > (or those countries). You are obviously convinced that using a command line interface can't be protected by copyright. Why, then, are you so persistent in insisting that other interfaces somehow are awarded such protection? -- Måns Rullgård [EMAIL PROTECTED] -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Linux and GPLv2
On Thu, Mar 31, 2005 at 09:17:51PM +0200, Måns Rullgård wrote: > Thanks for mentioning command lines. Running a program from the > command line, usually involves passing it options. These options are > (obviously) copies of strings from the actual program. Can this > copying be a copyright violation? IMHO, it is no different, in > principle, from using function names declared in a header file. If you can find us a country whose laws make this illegal, this issue would be worth discussing. If the laws of that country were available in english, we could probably do justice to that (hypothetical) discussion. If there are any such countries, and they make a practice of enforcing such laws (rather than just having them on the books to confuse novices), we should probably put together a page warning people to about using computers in that country (or those countries). -- Raul -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Draft summary of Creative Commons 2.0 licenses (version 3)
Andrew Suffield <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > On Thu, Mar 31, 2005 at 06:26:22PM +0100, Matthew Garrett wrote: >> The same phrase appears in several other licenses that we consider free. >> Your argument appears to be that we should consider those licenses >> non-free because the words can be interpreted in a non-free manner. > > Whenever such licenses appear, we either get them fixed or explicitly > clarified by the author. That is what we are trying to do here, > despite the best efforts of some people to obstruct the process. No we don't. There's huge chunks of X under licenses like that without us having obtained any clarification. We assume that they're free unless the copyright holder claims otherwise. You might like that to be changed, but what you're claiming is simply untrue - current practice is not to read licenses in the worst possible light. -- Matthew Garrett | [EMAIL PROTECTED] -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: [jdev] Jabberd 1.4.x license concerns/questions
On Fri, Apr 01, 2005 at 12:47:15AM -0700, Jamin W.Collins wrote: > Based on the recent concerns I began checking each Jabberd source file > for license indication in the hopes of distributing Jabberd under the > GPL or some other allowed license. Unfortunately, what I found was a > bit of a mess. Bits of Jabberd are under a variety of different > licenses and some don't indicate any license at all. From what I've > been able to find the files are listed under one of the following: > - Modified Apache 1.0 > - BSD > - JOSL > - MPL v1.1 > - none > - either JOSL or GPLv2+ > > I'm not up on all the interactions between the various licenses, but I > have had a previous situation with MPL and GPL interaction and they > are considered by most to be incompatible. The MPL, the JOSL, and the modified Apache license are probably all GPL-incompatible. > As the Jabberd source currently stands, I'm not sure the resultant > binaries are distributable at all due to the various licenses and/or > lack there of. It seems pretty clear that they aren't. The MPL and the unlicensed stuff are the worst problems. Time to hunt down the jabberd upstream and shake them. > I've attached a complete file listing of the 1.4.3 source grouped by > indicated license (or lack thereof). I've also grouped several files > that don't indicate a license but I'm not sure they need to (generated > Makefiles, short scripts, READMEs, etc). I would expect to see a license for the whole tree, of the form "Anything not otherwise stated is licensed under the GPL", to cover the build system and documentation and stuff. Individual files might not need to be, but (eg) the build system as a whole does. -- .''`. ** Debian GNU/Linux ** | Andrew Suffield : :' : http://www.debian.org/ | `. `' | `- -><- | signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: Draft summary of Creative Commons 2.0 licenses (version 3)
On Thu, Mar 31, 2005 at 06:26:22PM +0100, Matthew Garrett wrote: > Andrew Suffield <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > This not a theory. This is practical experience. This is why pine is > > not free. > > The awkward phrase in the pine license is: > > "Permission to use, copy, modify, and distribute this software and its > documentation for any purpose and without fee to the University of > Washington is hereby granted" > > The same phrase appears in several other licenses that we consider free. > Your argument appears to be that we should consider those licenses > non-free because the words can be interpreted in a non-free manner. Whenever such licenses appear, we either get them fixed or explicitly clarified by the author. That is what we are trying to do here, despite the best efforts of some people to obstruct the process. -- .''`. ** Debian GNU/Linux ** | Andrew Suffield : :' : http://www.debian.org/ | `. `' | `- -><- | signature.asc Description: Digital signature
