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- From: zeleny@husc10.harvard.edu (Mikhail Zeleny)
- Newsgroups: gnu.misc.discuss,talk.philosophy.misc,misc.legal
- Subject: Re: Fund raising at the FSF
- Message-ID: <1993Jan10.125629.19161@husc3.harvard.edu>
- Date: 10 Jan 93 17:56:28 GMT
- References: <1iindhINNfu5@agate.berkeley.edu> <1993Jan7.230129.19091@husc3.harvard.edu> <1imlr5INN2tu@early-bird.think.com>
- Organization: The Phallogocentric Cabal
- Lines: 90
- Nntp-Posting-Host: husc10.harvard.edu
-
- In article <1imlr5INN2tu@early-bird.think.com>
- barmar@think.com (Barry Margolin) writes:
-
- >In article <1993Jan7.230129.19091@husc3.harvard.edu>
- >zeleny@husc10.harvard.edu (Michael Zeleny) writes:
-
- MZ:
- >>That depends on whether the license attaches to the program type or
- >>any individual token thereof. I assume that the former is the case,
- >>as the latter does not seem to make any sense. In any case, your
- >>claim that, "as the owner of the work, [you] can make another copy
- >>with a different copyright agreement attached", directly contradicts
- >>the statement of the GPL, which regulates *all* copying, modification,
- >>sublicensing, distribution, or transfer of the licensed program.
- >>Since any derivative code is required to be so licensed, and since we
- >>have _ex hypothesi_, that your code has been so derived, it appears
- >>that you are dead wrong.
-
- BM:
- >The simple way to avoid the GPL "virus" problem on your own work is to
- >apply the GPL to the copy rather than the original, i.e. write a program
- >and make it proprietary, make a copy of it (as the owner, you have this
- >right), and slap the GPL on this copy. Derivatives of the copy must
- >inherit the GPL, but derivatives of the original can be subject to any
- >terms you wish.
-
- You are begging the question: your scenario will work only if the GPL
- attaches to the token.
-
- BM:
- >The actual force of the GPL as a true "license" has never actually been
- >tested. I'm not a lawyer, but it looks very much like "shrink-wrap"
- >licenses, which many people believe are not really enforceable. The GPL is
- >probably better viewed as a description of the copyright terms; thus, using
- >the GPL doesn't remove copyright rights such as the "fair use" doctrine.
- >And given this, the terms *do* apply to the token, not the type, since
- >copyright applies to expressions not ideas (although with software, the
- >line between token and type is fuzzy).
-
- You are very confused.
-
- {\bf A common mode of estimating the amount of matter in an MS.\thinspace
- or printed page is to count the number of words. There will ordinarily be
- about twenty {\it the}'s on a page, and of course they count as twenty
- words. In another sense of the word ``word'', however, there is but one
- word ``the'' in the English language; and it is impossible that this word
- should lie visibly on a page or be heard in any voice, for the reason that
- it is not a Single thing or a Single event. It does not exist; it only
- determines things that do exist. Such a definitely significant Form, I
- propose to term a {\it Type.} A single event which happens once and whose
- identity is limited to that one happening or a Single object or thing which
- is in some single place at any one instant of time, such event or thin
- being significant only as occurring just when and where it does, I will
- venture to call a {\it Token.}}\footnote{See [Peirce 1935--66]: 4, 537.}
-
- As you can see, there is nothing fuzzy about the distinction.
-
- MZ:
- >>The ownership is just what is at issue here. I have argued that the GPL
- >>assigns the ownership to the FSF, superseding any existing copyrights.
- >>(Note that I am referring to _de facto_ ownership, as determined by the
- >>exclusive right to control the aforementioned activities, and not any
- >>official version thereof. I am not interested in any possibility of _de
- >>jure_ ownership, which does not allow you to dispose of the goods as you
- >>see fit.)
-
- BM:
- >I think this is the crux of the confusion.
- >
- >If the FSF were the owner of all GPLed programs, then it could *change* the
- >terms of the license of any of these programs. But it can't. Unless he
- >has assigned the rights to another party, the original author is still the
- >only one who can set the licensing terms. The fact that he happens to set
- >the same terms as the FSF does doesn't mean that the FSF takes control of
- >it. As someone else pointed out, if the FSF comes out with a GPL version
- >3, it doesn't affect programs that are licensed using GPL v2.
-
- According to Paragraph 8 (V1), any of the subsequent revised versions
- of the GPL may be selected by the licensee, at his own discretion,
- instead of the version specified in the program he is using.
-
- >--
- >Barry Margolin
- >System Manager, Thinking Machines Corp.
- >
- >barmar@think.com {uunet,harvard}!think!barmar
-
- cordially,
- mikhail zeleny@husc.harvard.edu
- "Le cul des femmes est monotone comme l'esprit des hommes."
-