Sanjoy Mahajan <[email protected]> wrote:
> Linus Torvalds wrote:
> > That said, I think they are still pushing the "you don't have any
> > rights unless we give you additional rights explicitly" angle a bit
> > too hard.
>
> From section 2 (GPLv3, draft 2):
>
> This License acknowledges your rights of "fair use" or other
> equivalent, as provided by copyright law.
>
> By choosing 'acknowledges' as the verb, the licensee says explicitly
> that fair-use rights are already yours, not that they are being given
> to you.
Pure noise, a license can't take them away in any case.
[That is my pet pevee with GPL: It has a bit of legally binding text, and
lots of "explanation" and "philosophy" that don't add anything but
confusion. A clear-cut license plus an explanation/comment would have been
better. IMHO, IANAL. HAND.]
--
Dr. Horst H. von Brand User #22616 counter.li.org
Departamento de Informatica Fono: +56 32 2654431
Universidad Tecnica Federico Santa Maria +56 32 2654239
Casilla 110-V, Valparaiso, Chile Fax: +56 32 2797513
>> [GPL acknowledging fair-use rights]
> Pure noise, a license can't take them away in any case.
A bare license probably cannot take them away, since you haven't
agreed to anything. But (1) that may not be true in all legal
systems, and (2) a contract-based license can take it away (e.g. an
NDA). So the GPL's clarification is worthwhile. For the same reason,
I'm guessing, the Creative Commons licenses have (also in section 2,
at least in v2.5):
2. Fair Use Rights. Nothing in this license is intended to reduce,
limit, or restrict any rights arising from fair use, first sale or
other limitations on the exclusive rights of the copyright owner
under copyright law or other applicable laws.
-Sanjoy
`Never underestimate the evil of which men of power are capable.'
--Bertrand Russell, _War Crimes in Vietnam_, chapter 1.
On Dec 19, 2006, "Horst H. von Brand" <[email protected]> wrote:
> Sanjoy Mahajan <[email protected]> wrote:
>> This License acknowledges your rights of "fair use" or other
>> equivalent, as provided by copyright law.
>> By choosing 'acknowledges' as the verb, the licensee says explicitly
>> that fair-use rights are already yours, not that they are being given
>> to you.
> Pure noise, a license can't take them away in any case.
Yeah, that's merely informative, indeed. Point is to ensure people
know their rights, while at the same time avoiding giving impressions
such the one Linus somehow got.
> [That is my pet pevee with GPL: It has a bit of legally binding text, and
> lots of "explanation" and "philosophy" that don't add anything but
> confusion. A clear-cut license plus an explanation/comment would have been
> better. IMHO, IANAL. HAND.]
This bit would probably fit better in the spirit (preamble) than in
the letter. That's why I filed the comment about it in the preamble.
--
Alexandre Oliva http://www.lsd.ic.unicamp.br/~oliva/
FSF Latin America Board Member http://www.fsfla.org/
Red Hat Compiler Engineer aoliva@{redhat.com, gcc.gnu.org}
Free Software Evangelist oliva@{lsd.ic.unicamp.br, gnu.org}