If you want the least restrictive “license” available, then your work
should be placed into the public domain. Somehow, that doesn’t seem to
be very popular…
David Douthitt
CUNA & Affiliates
UNIX Systems Administrator
LPI Level 1, Linux+
ddouthitt@cuna.coop
B.Candler@pobox.com 7/10/03 5:09AM >>>
And I’m trying to understand in detail why you don’t like the GPL.
It
seems you don’t like it because of its “philosophical baggage” and
not because you want to allow commercial entities to use your code
in their closed apps.
restrictive that other licences. For free software, the fewer legal
burdens
which are placed on me (the user), or which I (the writer) place on my
users, the more comfortable I am.
If you’re trying to make a living out of selling software, that’s a
different matter. Dual-licencing seems to be the solution there: if you
want
to use my work for free, then your own derived work has to be tainted
with
the same conditions. If you don’t want that - because you want to make
money
out of our combined work - then buy a licence. That way, we both
receive
compensation for the commercial application of our work.
Sleepycat’s licence for BDB is a good example.
Regards,
Brian.
···
On Thu, Jul 10, 2003 at 03:58:11PM +0900, Robert Feldt wrote:
From my point of view, I don’t like the GPL simply because it is more
Just because of liability issues I think. The one restriction people want is
“you cannot sue me for any consequential damage from using this software”
Whether you could sue someone for consequential damage from public domain
software, though, I very much doubt.
Regards,
Brian.
···
On Thu, Jul 10, 2003 at 11:05:37PM +0900, David Douthitt wrote:
If you want the least restrictive “license” available, then your work
should be placed into the public domain. Somehow, that doesn’t seem to
be very popular…
Um, well, in European countries, it’s not possible to surrender an author’s rights. It’s dubious as to whether or not US copyright law actually respects a “public domain” release, either. Finally, there are two other issues. One is the potential liability issue mentioned previously. Second is that even the BSD requires that the copyright statement be retained – so “credit where due” is followed, at least in the source.
-austin
···
On Thu, 10 Jul 2003 23:05:37 +0900, David Douthitt wrote:
If you want the least restrictive “license” available, then your
work should be placed into the public domain. Somehow, that doesn’t
seem to be very popular…
–
austin ziegler * austin@halostatue.ca * Toronto, ON, Canada
software designer * pragmatic programmer * 2003.07.10
* 16:30:38
IANAL, but I believe that at least in the UK, the concept of putting a work
into the public domain is well defined.
Regards,
Brian.
···
On Fri, Jul 11, 2003 at 05:45:13AM +0900, Austin Ziegler wrote:
Um, well, in European countries, it’s not possible to surrender an
author’s rights. It’s dubious as to whether or not US copyright law
actually respects a “public domain” release, either. Finally, there are
two other issues. One is the potential liability issue mentioned
previously. Second is that even the BSD requires that the copyright
statement be retained – so “credit where due” is followed, at least in
the source.