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List:       koffice-devel
Subject:    Re: koffice policies and copyright policy
From:       Matt Williams <matt () milliams ! com>
Date:       2010-09-03 14:57:43
Message-ID: AANLkTikNjwMSk6FOggkK4z-GZbvAF9k=z1i4WdmPCKdv () mail ! gmail ! com
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On 3 September 2010 15:48, Cyrille Berger <cberger@cberger.net> wrote:
> On Friday 03 September 2010, Dr. Robert Marmorstein wrote:
>> In particular, I've heard several people assert that having an unwarranted
>> copyright is legally "NULL".
> It comes from [1], and afaik, the SFLC is run by lawyers.
>
>> That is, that it has no legal effect.  I can
>> understand the argument for this claim, but I think it deserves closer
>> attention before we accept it at face value.  If I understand it correctly,
>> the argument is that the GPL protects us against abuse of the copyright, so
>> that if someone who shouldn't have a copyright on the file does in fact
>> claim copyright nothing bad can happen.
> The GPL does not give us that. It is the copyright law that does.
>
>> I'm curious, though, what happens with relicensing?  Suppose KDE moves to a
>> new licence (GPLv4, someday??).  Wouldn't we need to get the consent of
>> each copyright holder in order to move to the new license?
> GPLv4 is a bad example, since most of our code is licensed in such a way that
> it allows to move the code to GPLv4, but yes if you want to move to an other
> license, like BSD, you would need to get the consent of each "real" copyright
> holder, not just the one listed in top of the file.
>
>> Couldn't a
>> malicious copyright holder create problems in the relicensing process
>> using code that they should never have had copyright on in the first
>> place?
> You don't get copyright on code because you put your name on top of the file,
> you get copyright on code by your contribution. So if a developer has put
> itself on a file, but without a claim, even 10 years later, we can relicence
> the file without his agreement. However, if his name is missing on top of the
> file, and he has copyright claim, and because his name is not mentioned on the
> file, and therefor he his not asked about the relicensing, then he is in
> position to sue.
>
>> Because I work in the academic world where correct attribution is very
>> important, I'm a little resistant to the idea of giving someone a copyright
>> on code that they've hardly contributed to.  If one of my students did
>> that and turned it in as a project I would probably give him a failing
>> grade and bring him (or her) up on honor charges.  I realize that an open
>> source is very different from a classroom project, but I think some of the
>> same concerns apply.  I'd feel a lot more confident about adopting a
>> policy on this if someone with some professional legal experience had
>> looked it over first, to catch any glaring errors or loopholes.
> You have to consider that currently members of our community are engaged in
> what I would call a copyright-claim-war, the main goal of that policy is to
> put an end to it, this is why there is an urgency, this is why we can't wait
> for a possible KDE one or to get legal advice. But again, at the end of the
> week, nothing will be set in stone, it will be a guideline to use for the next
> few months, until we get an answer from the FSF, EFF or SFLC, or that KDE get
> a guideline of its own.

While not a solution to the current discussion, don't forget about the
FLA (http://ev.kde.org/rules/fla.php) which should help to reduce this
problem to a certain degree.

Regards,
Matt Williams
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