> > The *GPL extends the circumstances where I can take somebodies work. > > but isn't this notion rather frightening?
Frightning? Have you been effected with Brett fear mongering? :-) I don't consider it frightning. Copyleft is a trade where someone was allowed distribute my work and did and as companation I can take his related work. Of course this is not always good as I have been arguing in countless mail, but that is another thing. Sometimes this is good idea sometimes it is not. > > > nor does it force you to give up your copyright (effectively). > > > > Neither does the LGPL you can still license the code to others > > under any license. You just have to give it back under the > > LGPL as well. > > if you have to give out an unlimited, royalty free license to your > work, I think it's not unfair to say that you have given up your > copyright protection. As the copyright holder, it's true that you > can relicense it to suit other licenses, but it's not clear to me > that you can clearly make a copyright infringment case if there is > an LGPLed copy in the public. Well if somebody uses my work in a way either not permitted by LGPL or explicitly permited by me through some other license I can't see why I can't sue. At least not unless you claim that Open Source == Public Domain, but that is something else entirely.