LinuxLists.cc - Re: Wasting our Freedom

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Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

Can E. Acar wrote:
> There have been complete silence from the leaders of their own
> community (Linux Kernel developers, FSF, ...) all perhaps used your

Regarding "Linux Kernel developers," false. _I_ have posted. ath5k,
wireless, and net driver maintainers have all sent emails. License and
code fixes have been committed.

As for the FSF: It has been repeatedly stated that the FSF has zip to
do with this. Nothing. Nada. Zero. Zilch. Linux != FSF.

> argument to convince themselves that this is not their problem.
> However, from an outsider point of view, this lack of silence means
> an agreement to something that is ethically and legally wrong.

You are failing to observe that changes have been made in response to
criticism.

Given that Linux Kernel devs have responded both with code changes and
emails, "silence" and "inaction" are provably false.

And since the changes go ath5k->linville->me->linus or
ath5k->linville->me->davem->linus, I am a step in the approval chain. I
do know what I'm talking about. :)

Jeff

2007-09-16 19:59:15

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Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 11:48:47AM -0700, Can E. Acar wrote:
>...
> First, these developers got questionable advice from senior Linux kernel
> developers, and SLFC (which is closely related to FSF) in the process.

The most questionable legal advice in this thread was by Theo de Raadt
who claimed choosing one licence for _dual-licenced_ code was illegal...

This was the first email that was forwarded to linux-kernel, and it made
it really hard to see at first that there was also an accidental
copyright violation in Jiri's (never merged) patch.

> There have been complete silence from the leaders of their own
> community (Linux Kernel developers, FSF, ...)
>...

s/community/communities/

This seems to be a common thinko by some people:

The Linux kernel developers and the FSF are two very distinct
communities, and there are quite different views on some copyright
issues.

There is no "GPL community" covering both, there might be some kind of
"open source community" - but this would as well include OpenBSD.

> This case illustrates some important issues that should interest ALL
> free software developers:
>
> 1) How tricky code sharing between different projects can be even when
> intents and goals are pretty much alike.

It should now be resolved how to incorporate BSD licenced code correctly
into GPL'ed code, or is there any unresolved legal problem?

> 2) MANY developers on BOTH sides have NO clue about the laws and ethics
> associated with handling Copyrights and Licenses.

I agree with you regarding the laws.

Regarding ethics - if you use the BSD licence for your code you state in
the licence text that it's OK that I take your code and never give
anything back.

Both Linux and Microsoft have used BSD licenced code according to this
licence.

Some people have the funny position of opposing the GPL which enforces
that you have to give back, but whining that people took their BSD
licenced code and don't give back.

Everyone can choose the licence he likes for his own code, but if
intentions and licence text don't match that's the fault of the person
who licenced his code that way.

> 3) The copyrights and licenses are the foundations of our work.
> We put out great usually volunteer work, to create and improve.
> The licenses specify the terms and conditions under which we allow
> our work to be used. When we allow ANY license violation to occur,
> it affects our own work, regardless of the license on it.
>...

Who allowed any licence violation?

Let's look at the facts:
- Each year, at about two thousand different people contribute patches
that get incorporated into the Linux kernel.
- One of them made the mistake of accidentally sending a patch that
would have wrongly deleted the BSD header from BSD code.
- Other developers didn't notice this mistake when looking at the patch.
- This patch has never been merged.

A mistake.
No bad intentions.
Shit happens.
Resolved as soon as people were made aware of the mistake.

> Can

cu
Adrian

--

"Is there not promise of rain?" Ling Tan asked suddenly out
of the darkness. There had been need of rain for many days.
"Only a promise," Lao Er said.
Pearl S. Buck - Dragon Seed

2007-09-16 20:32:48

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Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Sunday 16 September 2007 14:48:47 Can E. Acar wrote:
> On Sunday 16 September 2007 15:23:25 Daniel Hazelton wrote:
> > On Sunday 16 September 2007 05:17:53 J.C. Roberts wrote:
> >> On Sunday 16 September 2007, Jeff Garzik wrote:
> >> > J.C. Roberts wrote:
> >> > > http://marc.info/?l=linux-wireless&m=118857712529898&w=2
> >> >
> >> > Link with outdated info.
> >> >
> >> > > http://madwifi.org/browser/branches/ath5k
> >> >
> >> > Link with outdated info.
> >> >
> >> > > I suggest actually taking the time to get the facts before making
> >> > > completely baseless statements. When you make obviously erroneous
> >> > > statements, it leaves everyone to believe you are either hopelessly
> >> > > misinformed, or a habitual liar. -Which is it?
> >> >
> >> > Please take a moment to understand the Linux development process.
> >> >
> >> > A better place to look would be 'ath5k' branch of
> >> > git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/linville/wireless-dev.g
> >> >it
> >> >
> >> > but nonethless, the fact remains that ath5k is STILL NOT UPSTREAM and
> >> > HAS NEVER BEEN UPSTREAM, as can be verified from
> >> >
> >> > git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux-2.6.git
> >> > (official linux repo; nothing is official until it hits here)
> >> >
> >> > Part of the reason why ath5k is not upstream is that developers are
> >> > actively addressing these copyright concerns -- as can be clearly
> >> > seen by the changes being made over time.
> >> >
> >> > So let's everybody calm down, ok?
> >> >
> >> > Regards,
> >> >
> >> > Jeff
> >>
> >> Jeff,
> >>
> >> Look at what you are saying from a different perspective. Let's say
> >> someone took the linux kernel source from the official repository,
> >> removed the GPL license and dedicated the work to public domain or put
> >> it under any other license, and for kicks back-dated the files so they
> >> are older than the originals. Then they took this illegal license
> >> removal copy of your code and put it in a public repository somewhere.
> >>
> >> You'd be perfectly content with such a development because it had not
> >> been officially brought "upstream" by the "offical" public domain or
> >> whatever project?
> >
> > But that isn't the situation being discussed. You've sent this mail to
> > the *LINUX* *KERNEL* ML, not the MadWifi ML. The patches in question were
> > not accepted into the Linux Kernel, so this is *NOT* the place to send
> > mail related to them.
>
> You are so cleanly isolating and cutting away of a group of developers.
> I sincerely hope your fellow developers will not cut you off if you
> make a similar mistake. I know mine wont.

No, I'm saying "You are complaining about this in the wrong place and accusing
the wrong people of the misdeed."

> What you are saying is, a Copyright violation done by someone else is
> Somebody Else's Problem (tm). There are a couple of issues with this point
> of view:
>
> First, these developers got questionable advice from senior Linux kernel
> developers, and SLFC (which is closely related to FSF) in the process.

IIRC, the advice was "Yes, it is legal to choose to follow only one of
multiple offered licenses on a project" - nothing else. They looked at the
patches and said "Wait, you've changed the license on files that aren't under
a dual license."

Hence, no problems here - no questionable advice only.

<snip>
>
> > *PLEASE* go do a Google search or check the MadWifi site for their
> > discussion list/forum/whatever and complain there.
>
> This has been done. Really. They have been contacted privately
> before the issue became public. Got no results. The issue is then made
> public,
> with the results you see now. This is no longer a MadWifi problem.

Then file the lawsuit - if they have violated the license and ignored requests
to fix the problem then there is sound legal grounds for it.

<snip>
>
> > If the OpenBSD developers want to attack the Linux Kernel community over
> > patches that were *NEVER* *ACCEPTED* by said community, it should be just
> > as fair for the Linux Kernel community to complain about those
> > (unspecified) times where OpenBSD replaced the GPL on code with the BSD
> > license.
>
> It is fair. All license issues deserve utmost attention and respect by
> all communities. If we let such issues to go unresolved, we face a
> much greater danger to our work.

Yes, but in this case you are complaining to people that have no control over
the code in question. It's known that the patches are bad, and if people
continue to use them, then it is their problem and the problem of the
copyright holder.

<snip>
>
> Is it too naive to hope that some leader/senior developer from the
> Linux/FSF/GNU
> whatever will take the clue stick and let the developers know what is
> happening
> is wrong. Being leaders in a community do have some responsibilities you
> know.

And it has happened - the Linux Kernel community has commented on the
situation a *LOT* - to the extent that the patches in question were
rejected - long *BEFORE* Theo commented on it.

> > And, as said before, the place to take these complaints is the MadWifi
> > discussion area, since they are, apparently, the only people that
> > accepted the patches in question.
> >
> >> If the people who could fix the problem continued to ignore you, and the
> >> people in leadership roles tell you then intend to steal your code,
> >> then you would continue to get more angry and vocal about it.
> >
> > *WE*, the people on the Linux Kernel ML, *CANNOT* "fix the problem" with
> > the *MADWIFI* code having accepted patches which violate Reyk's
> > copyright.
>
> *WE* the OpenBSD people *DO NOT* want you to "fix the problem". We want you
> to be aware of the issues, and react responsibly. A response from the
> leaders
> of their own community would have a MUCH GREATER impact in ending the
> discussion
> and ending all the trolling.

This has happened. Or are you ignoring the evidence in favor of more trolling
and FUD ?

> But it appears, disowning them is a much convenient solution for most
> "leaders".

Learn to read. It has happened.

> >> Now take it one step further. For the sake of example, let's assume all
> >> of this atheros driver nonsense went to a German court and the
> >> GNU/FSF/SFLC/Linux or whoever you want to call yourselves lost a
> >> criminal copyright infringement suit. You have now been legally proven
> >> to be guilty code theft.
> >>
> >> After such a ruling let's assume some jerk was to do the all the
> >> horrific stuff mentioned in the first paragraph above to the linux
> >> source tree, along with a little regex magic to call it something other
> >> than "linux" and seeded the Internet with countless copies. At this
> >> point, the GNU, FSF, GPL and all of the hard working Linux devs are now
> >> stuffed. A company could download the bogus source, violate the now
> >> missing GPL license, claim you stole the code from someplace else on
> >> the `net and illegally put your GPL license on it... Worst of all, they
> >> now have your past conviction of criminal code theft to back up their
> >> assertion about the way you normally operate.
> >>
> >> You should be concerned. The above is an immoral and illegal but still
> >> practical attack on the GPL and all of hard work by many great people.
> >> By having some people within the GNU/FSF/GPL camp indulging in code
> >> theft to push their preferred license and the reasonable folks in the
> >> GNU/FSF/GPL camp refusing to voice a strong opinion against code theft,
> >> you are weakening your own license.
> >
> > Linux Kernel != FSF/GNU
> >
> > If it was then RMS would not be attacking Linus and Linux with faulty
> > claims just because Linus has publicly stated that the GPLv2 is a better
> > license than v3 and because Linux cannot, for numerous reasons, ever be
> > released under the GPLv3.
> >
> > I repeat - Linux has *NOT* and will *NEVER* accept the patches in
> > question. If somebody else has, then go and yell at them about it. The
> > developers here, on the LINUX KERNEL MAILING LIST, have no control or
> > authority (in general) over projects such as MadWifi. If they have
> > accepted the faulty patches - and said patches are now part of their
> > code-base, then go tell them about it and make sure Theo gets the
> > message.
>
> I repeat, you do NOT have to be in control of a project to take action.
>
> The silence means you are fine with copyright violations. It means that if,
> for some reason, we stopped (or did not start) yelling, then you would
> let it be.

No, I'm not. In fact, I don't use MadWifi, endorse it or even like it. I even
advise people *NOT* to use it. Or is that *NOT* enough for you?

DRH

--
Dialup is like pissing through a pipette. Slow and excruciatingly painful.

2007-09-16 20:47:07

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Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

Hi!

On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 09:59:09PM +0200, Adrian Bunk wrote:
>On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 11:48:47AM -0700, Can E. Acar wrote:
>>...
>> First, these developers got questionable advice from senior Linux kernel
>> developers, and SLFC (which is closely related to FSF) in the process.

>The most questionable legal advice in this thread was by Theo de Raadt
>who claimed choosing one licence for _dual-licenced_ code was illegal...

JFTR, I do *not* think that that assessment was questionable. Unless the
dual-licensing *explicitly* allows relicensing, relicensing is forbidden
by copyright law. The dual-licensing allows relicensing only if that's
*explicitly* stated, either in the statement offering the alternative, or
in one of the licenses.

Neither GPL nor BSD/ISC allow relicensing in their well-known wordings.

If you think that's questionable, you should at least provide arguments
(and be ready to have your interpretation of the law and the licenses
tested before court).

>[...]

>Regarding ethics - if you use the BSD licence for your code you state in
>the licence text that it's OK that I take your code and never give
>anything back.

But the BSDl does not allow you to relicense the original code, even
while it allows you to license copyrightable additions/modifications
under different terms with few restrictions.

However, you say "regarding ethics" and just go back to the legal level.
Is it really ethical, if you consider both Linux and OpenBSD part of one
OSS "community", to share things only in one direction? To take the
reverse engineered HAL but to not allow OpenBSD to take some
modifications back?

>[...]

>Some people have the funny position of opposing the GPL which enforces
>that you have to give back, but whining that people took their BSD
>licenced code and don't give back.

A difference is, GPL requires it under every circumstance. BSD does not,
indeed. But how should one expect it from *OSS* people that even *they*
don't give back? Do you really want to put yourself on the same level as
closed-source companies?

>[...]

Kind regards,

Hannah.

2007-09-16 21:11:40

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Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Sunday 16 September 2007 16:39:26 Hannah Schroeter wrote:
> Hi!
>
> On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 09:59:09PM +0200, Adrian Bunk wrote:
> >On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 11:48:47AM -0700, Can E. Acar wrote:
> >>...
> >> First, these developers got questionable advice from senior Linux kernel
> >> developers, and SLFC (which is closely related to FSF) in the process.
> >
> >The most questionable legal advice in this thread was by Theo de Raadt
> >who claimed choosing one licence for _dual-licenced_ code was illegal...
>
> JFTR, I do *not* think that that assessment was questionable. Unless the
> dual-licensing *explicitly* allows relicensing, relicensing is forbidden
> by copyright law. The dual-licensing allows relicensing only if that's
> *explicitly* stated, either in the statement offering the alternative, or
> in one of the licenses.

That advice wasn't regarding relicensing. Dual-licensed code allows
distribution and use under either license. If I get BSD/GPL code, I can
follow the GPL exclusively and I don't have to follow the BSD license at all.
And the alternative is also true. (ie: follow the BSD license exclusively and
ignore the GPL)

It's not "relicensing" - it's following *WHICH* of the offered terms are more
agreeable.

I'll just snip the rest, since you seem confused.

<snip>

DRH

--
Dialup is like pissing through a pipette. Slow and excruciatingly painful.

2007-09-16 21:12:35

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Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 10:39:26PM +0200, Hannah Schroeter wrote:
> >The most questionable legal advice in this thread was by Theo de Raadt
> >who claimed choosing one licence for _dual-licenced_ code was illegal...
>
> JFTR, I do *not* think that that assessment was questionable. Unless the
> dual-licensing *explicitly* allows relicensing, relicensing is forbidden
> by copyright law. The dual-licensing allows relicensing only if that's
> *explicitly* stated, either in the statement offering the alternative, or
> in one of the licenses.
>
> Neither GPL nor BSD/ISC allow relicensing in their well-known wordings.
>
> If you think that's questionable, you should at least provide arguments
> (and be ready to have your interpretation of the law and the licenses
> tested before court).

Hannah,

What is going on whenever someone changes a code is that they make a
"derivative work". Whether or not you can even make a derivative
work, and under what terms the derivitive work can be licensed, is
strictly up to the license of the original. For example, the BSD
license says:

Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions
are met....

Note the "with or without modification". This is what allows people
to change BSD licensed code and redistribute said changes. The
conditions specified by the BSD license do not mention anything about
licening terms --- just that if you meet these three conditions, you
are allowed to redistribute them. So for example, this is what allows
Network Appliances to take BSD code, change it, and add a restrictive,
proprietary copyright.

So for code which is single-licensed under a BSD license, someone can
create a new derived work, and redistribute it under a more
restrictive license --- either one as restrictive as NetApp's (where
no one is allowed to get binary unless they are a NetApp customer, or
source only after signing an NDA), or a GPL license. It is not a
relicencing, per se, since the original version of the file is still
available under the original copyright; it is only the derived work
which is under the more restrictive copyright.

Now, the original copyright can say that you aren't allowed to do
this; for example, the GPL says that you are not allowed to add any
restrictions on the copyright license of any derived works of GPL'ed
code. This is why some BSD partisans claim that their license is
"more free"; the BSD license allows people to add more restrictive
copyright license terms on derived works.

OK, what about dual licensed works? The specific wording of the dual
licensing is that you can use *either* license. That means, you can
treat code as if only using the BSD license applied, or only if the
GPL license applied. That is, the end-user can redistribute if either
the conditions required by the BSD license *or* the GPL license
applied. But we've already shown that the BSD license allows the
creation of a derived work with a more restrictive license --- such as
the GPL.

But don't take my word for it; the Software Freedom Law Center has
issued advice, pro bono, written by lawyers about how this can be
done. If you want, feel free get your own lawyers and ask them to
provide formal legal advice.

> A difference is, GPL requires it under every circumstance. BSD does not,
> indeed. But how should one expect it from *OSS* people that even *they*
> don't give back? Do you really want to put yourself on the same level as
> closed-source companies?

The problem with your argument is that BSD folks have claimed that the
BSD license is morally superior --- "more free than the GPL" ---
because you don't have to "give back" (or more formally, create a
derivitive work with a copyright license more restrictive than the
BSD). If that is true, it is the absolute height of hypocrisy to
suddenly start complaining when code is restricted via an another open
source license such as the GPL, but not complain when NetApp uses BSD
code to make million and millions of dollars without giving anything
of substantial value back. At least in the case of GPL'ed code you
still can look at the changes and decide how and whether you to
reimplement them. Why don't you go and try asking NetApp for sources
to WAFL, and claim that they have "moral" duty to give the code back,
and see how quickly you get laughed out of the office?

- Ted

2007-09-16 21:13:48

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Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 10:39:26PM +0200, Hannah Schroeter wrote:
> Hi!
>
> On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 09:59:09PM +0200, Adrian Bunk wrote:
> >On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 11:48:47AM -0700, Can E. Acar wrote:
> >>...
> >> First, these developers got questionable advice from senior Linux kernel
> >> developers, and SLFC (which is closely related to FSF) in the process.
>
> >The most questionable legal advice in this thread was by Theo de Raadt
> >who claimed choosing one licence for _dual-licenced_ code was illegal...
>
> JFTR, I do *not* think that that assessment was questionable. Unless the
> dual-licensing *explicitly* allows relicensing, relicensing is forbidden
> by copyright law. The dual-licensing allows relicensing only if that's
> *explicitly* stated, either in the statement offering the alternative, or
> in one of the licenses.

Dual licenced code by definition explicitely states that you can choose
the licence - otherwise it wouldn't be called dual-licenced.

> Neither GPL nor BSD/ISC allow relicensing in their well-known wordings.

Noone said otherwise.

> If you think that's questionable, you should at least provide arguments
> (and be ready to have your interpretation of the law and the licenses
> tested before court).

The licence in question was:

<-- snip -->

/*-
* Copyright (c) 2002-2004 Sam Leffler, Errno Consulting
* All rights reserved.
*
* Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
* modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions
* are met:
* 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright
* notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer,
* without modification.
* 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce at minimum a disclaimer
* similar to the "NO WARRANTY" disclaimer below ("Disclaimer") and any
* redistribution must be conditioned upon including a substantially
* similar Disclaimer requirement for further binary redistribution.
* 3. Neither the names of the above-listed copyright holders nor the names
* of any contributors may be used to endorse or promote products derived
* from this software without specific prior written permission.
*
* Alternatively, this software may be distributed under the terms of the
* GNU General Public License ("GPL") version 2 as published by the Free
* Software Foundation.
*
* NO WARRANTY
* ...

<-- snip -->

Theo claimed it would "break the law" [1] to choose the GPL for
_this_ code. [2]

> >[...]
>
> >Regarding ethics - if you use the BSD licence for your code you state in
> >the licence text that it's OK that I take your code and never give
> >anything back.
>
> But the BSDl does not allow you to relicense the original code, even
> while it allows you to license copyrightable additions/modifications
> under different terms with few restrictions.
>
> However, you say "regarding ethics" and just go back to the legal level.
> Is it really ethical, if you consider both Linux and OpenBSD part of one
> OSS "community", to share things only in one direction? To take the
> reverse engineered HAL but to not allow OpenBSD to take some
> modifications back?

Is it really ethical to use a licence that does not require to give
back, but then demand that something has to be given back?

Why don't you use a licence that expresses your intentions in a legally
binding way?

> >[...]
>
> >Some people have the funny position of opposing the GPL which enforces
> >that you have to give back, but whining that people took their BSD
> >licenced code and don't give back.
>
> A difference is, GPL requires it under every circumstance. BSD does not,
> indeed. But how should one expect it from *OSS* people that even *they*
> don't give back? Do you really want to put yourself on the same level as
> closed-source companies?

You could also see it from a different perspective:

If you like that the GPL enforces that everyone has to give back, do you
also want to see your code BSD licenced without this protection?

But the truth is a bit less harsh:

In reality most Linux kernel developers might not mind to give back -
and e.g. much of the ACPI code is BSD/GPL dual-licenced, and there
doesn't seem to be any problem with this.

But Theo's wrong accusations regarding dual licenced code might not be
the best way for starting a fruitful collaboration...

> >[...]
>
> Kind regards,
>
> Hannah.

cu
Adrian

[1] http://lkml.org/lkml/2007/9/1/102
[2] The fact that Alan didn't notice that part of Jiri's patch touched
non-dual-licenced code is the mistake I already mentioned - but
this mistake is not what Theo is ranting about.

--

"Is there not promise of rain?" Ling Tan asked suddenly out
of the darkness. There had been need of rain for many days.
"Only a promise," Lao Er said.
Pearl S. Buck - Dragon Seed

2007-09-16 22:20:51

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Subject: RE: Wasting our Freedom

> JFTR, I do *not* think that that assessment was questionable. Unless the
> dual-licensing *explicitly* allows relicensing, relicensing is forbidden
> by copyright law. The dual-licensing allows relicensing only if that's
> *explicitly* stated, either in the statement offering the alternative, or
> in one of the licenses.
>
> Neither GPL nor BSD/ISC allow relicensing in their well-known wordings.
>
> If you think that's questionable, you should at least provide arguments
> (and be ready to have your interpretation of the law and the licenses
> tested before court).

Nobody is relicensing anything, ever.

If the author licenses a work under the GPL only, then that is forever how
that work is licensed. If an author licenses a work under the BSD, then that
is forever how that work is licensed. Same for a dual license. This applies
until the copyright expires or the author offers the code under some other
license.

Nobody ever relicenses anything, ever.

If I give you a copy of a work covered by the GPL, the BSD, a dual-license,
or whatever, you get a license to every protectable element in that work
from the original author of that element.

Nobody ever relicenses anything, ever. Nobody ever modifies anybody else's
license, ever.

If you take work that's under a dual-license and remove one license notice
from it when you create a derivative work, every recipient of that
derivative work still receives a dual license from the original author to
every protectable element still in the distributed work.

The GPL is explicit about this in section 6. The BSD license is not, but
it's the only way such a license could work.

There are really only two ways you can screw up.

1) You can take GPL-only bits and put them in BSD or dual-licensed code.
(The GPL prohibits this.)

2) You can remove a BSD license notice from BSD-only code. (The BSD license
prohibits this.)

DS

2007-09-16 22:39:18

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Subject: RE: Wasting our Freedom

> Dual licenced code by definition explicitely states that you can choose
> the licence - otherwise it wouldn't be called dual-licenced.

You can choose under which license you would like to receive the right to modify or distribute the code. But you cannot change the license that code itself is covered by.

> Theo claimed it would "break the law" [1] to choose the GPL for
> _this_ code. [2]

He is quite right. You cannot choose the license under which someone else's code is offered. It would "break the law" not in the sense that you would be breaking the law, in the sense that it's impossible because the law does not allow it.

You can, however, remove the BSD license notice if you'd like. While the BSD license prohibits you from removing it, you may choose to obtain the right to remove it from the GPL. The GPL does not prohibit removing a BSD license and explicitly grants you the right to make all modifications that it does not prohibit.

Note that this removal has no effect on the license on the original code.

Theo is right, you cannot choose the license on _this_ code. You can, of course, control the license on code that you contribute. Nothing prevents a derivative work from being under a different license from the original work.

DS

2007-09-16 23:09:33

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Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 03:37:55PM -0700, David Schwartz wrote:
>
> > Dual licenced code by definition explicitely states that you can choose
> > the licence - otherwise it wouldn't be called dual-licenced.
>
> You can choose under which license you would like to receive the right to modify or distribute the code. But you cannot change the license that code itself is covered by.

You can choose the licence under which you distribute the code.

It's obvious that everyone else receiving the dual licenced code still
can choose for himself.

> > Theo claimed it would "break the law" [1] to choose the GPL for
> > _this_ code. [2]
>
> He is quite right. You cannot choose the license under which someone else's code is offered. It would "break the law" not in the sense that you would be breaking the law, in the sense that it's impossible because the law does not allow it.
>
> You can, however, remove the BSD license notice if you'd like. While the BSD license prohibits you from removing it, you may choose to obtain the right to remove it from the GPL. The GPL does not prohibit removing a BSD license and explicitly grants you the right to make all modifications that it does not prohibit.
>
> Note that this removal has no effect on the license on the original code.
>
> Theo is right, you cannot choose the license on _this_ code. You can, of course, control the license on code that you contribute. Nothing prevents a derivative work from being under a different license from the original work.

It would have helped if you would have read the email I gave a link to...

Theo was saying in his email:

<-- snip -->

In http://lkml.org/lkml/2007/8/29/183, Alan Cox managed to summarize
what Jiri Slaby and Luis Rodriguez were trying to do by proposing a
modification of a Dual Licenced file without the consent of all the
authors. Alan asks "So whats the problem ?". Well, Alan, I must
caution you -- your post is advising people to break the law.

<-- snip -->

Theo claims quite clearly that removing the BSD licence notice when
modifying BSD/GPL dual licenced code would break the law.

> DS

cu
Adrian

BTW: It is considered impolite on linux-kernel to remove Cc's.

--

"Is there not promise of rain?" Ling Tan asked suddenly out
of the darkness. There had been need of rain for many days.
"Only a promise," Lao Er said.
Pearl S. Buck - Dragon Seed

2007-09-16 23:16:47

by Jacob Meuser

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 05:12:08PM -0400, Theodore Tso wrote:

> reimplement them. Why don't you go and try asking NetApp for sources
> to WAFL, and claim that they have "moral" duty to give the code back,
> and see how quickly you get laughed out of the office?

which is _exactly_ what you guys are doing.

so the linux community is morally equivilent to a corporation?

that's what it sounds like you are all legally satisfied with.

--
[email protected]
SDF Public Access UNIX System - http://sdf.lonestar.org

2007-09-16 23:41:42

by David Lang

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Sun, 16 Sep 2007, Jacob Meuser wrote:

> On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 05:12:08PM -0400, Theodore Tso wrote:
>
>> reimplement them. Why don't you go and try asking NetApp for sources
>> to WAFL, and claim that they have "moral" duty to give the code back,
>> and see how quickly you get laughed out of the office?
>
> which is _exactly_ what you guys are doing.
>
> so the linux community is morally equivilent to a corporation?
>
> that's what it sounds like you are all legally satisfied with.

if it's legal it's legal. it's not a matter of the Linux community being
satisfied eith it, it's a matter of the BSD people desiring it based on
their selection of license (and the repeated statements that this feature
of the BSD license being an advantage compared to the GPL makes it clear
that this isn't an unknown side effect, it's an explicit desire).

so the Linux community is following the desires of the BSD community by
following their license but the BSD community is unhappy, why?

you claim that it's unethical for the linux community to use the code, but
brag about NetApp useing the code. what makes NetApp ok and Linux evil?
many people honestly don't understand the logic behind this. please
explain it.

if you don't like what your license allows, change it. it's trivial for
you to do so, all you need to do is to agree on a new license and start
releaseing your code under it (the BSD license allows for derivitive works
to be released under any license) make the new license match your real
desires and this sort of problem can be avoided in the future.

David Lang

2007-09-17 00:01:29

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

[email protected] wrote:
> you claim that it's unethical for the linux community to use the code,
> but brag about NetApp useing the code. what makes NetApp ok and Linux
> evil? many people honestly don't understand the logic behind this.
> please explain it.

There are two highly relevant angles to this that nobody is mentioning:

1) Does it make sense to share code, at a technical level?

The fact is, BSD and Linux wireless stacks are quite different. Linux
also has a technical requirement that "Linux drivers look like Linux
drivers." This enables a vast array of source code checking tools like
Coverity and sparse, as well as maximizing human reviewer bandwidth.

Therefore, there is a strong /technical/ motivation for the source code
to diverge. That's quite natural.

2) Information sharing is both rampant and healthy.

Linux and BSD projects share a vast amount of hardware knowledge,
information on how to properly program hardware. Linux folks use BSD
code as /reference documentation/, and BSD folks do the same with Linux
code.

This is far more efficient in many cases, due to the natural divergence
of the respective codebases. It is often easier to look at codebase A,
and then mentally translate that into code for codebase B, than to
directly copy and reuse code.

Jeff

2007-09-17 00:30:50

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: RE: Wasting our Freedom

Adrian Bunk writes:

> On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 03:37:55PM -0700, David Schwartz wrote:

> > > Dual licenced code by definition explicitely states that you
> > > can choose
> > > the licence - otherwise it wouldn't be called dual-licenced.

> > You can choose under which license you would like to receive
> > the right to modify or distribute the code. But you cannot change
> > the license that code itself is covered by.

> You can choose the licence under which you distribute the code.

This is a misleading statement. When you distribute the code, you can choose from which license you obtain the right to distribute, but this has *NO* effect on the rights the recipient of the code gets.

This is a common misunderstanding, so people who understand the issue should work extra hard to be clear. If you obtain the right to distribute a dual-licensed work to me from the GPL, I still receive a dual-license to the work from the original author. You are not a party to the grant and cannot modify it.

> It's obvious that everyone else receiving the dual licenced code still
> can choose for himself.

Everyone receiving dual-licensed code who wishes to modify or distribute that code may choose from which license they obtain that right. They need only comply with the terms of the license from which they obtain rights. But this has no effect on anybody else nor does it have any effect on what rights recipients get to that original work.

In every case, a recipient gets from the original author all the rights the original author offered to those elements that person authored.

> > Theo is right, you cannot choose the license on _this_ code.
> > You can, of course, control the license on code that you
> > contribute. Nothing prevents a derivative work from being under a
> > different license from the original work.

> It would have helped if you would have read the email I gave a link to...
>
> Theo was saying in his email:
>
> <-- snip -->
>
> In http://lkml.org/lkml/2007/8/29/183, Alan Cox managed to summarize
> what Jiri Slaby and Luis Rodriguez were trying to do by proposing a
> modification of a Dual Licenced file without the consent of all the
> authors. Alan asks "So whats the problem ?". Well, Alan, I must
> caution you -- your post is advising people to break the law.
>
> <-- snip -->
>
> Theo claims quite clearly that removing the BSD licence notice when
> modifying BSD/GPL dual licenced code would break the law.

In responses and posts, there is over and over a huge confusion between two completely different issues. One is about whether you can modify licenses, the other is about whether you can modify license *notices*.

You can obtain the right to modify or remove a BSD license *notice* from the GPL. The GPL gives you the right to modify and doesn't require you to keep any *other* licenses intact. But this is simply a change to a notice. It has no effect on anyone's actual substantive rights whatsoever.

To the extent that others are saying that you cannot modify the *license*, they are correct. The original author extended that license to all recipients of their code, regardless of how they get them, and you cannot affect this process in any way.

Again, one more time:

1) You can obtain, from the GPL, the right to remove a BSD license notice.

2) You can obtain, from the BSD license, the right to remove a GPL license notice.

3) Neither of these actions has any effect on the fact that these licenses still exist from the original author and still grant rights to anyone who comes into lawful possession of the work.

Of course, if you take a dual-licensed file, remove the BSD notice, and then add more to it, those contributions can be offered *by* *their* *original* *authors* under only the GPL.

Any protectable elements still in the work that were offered by their original authors under either a dual-license or a BSD license are still licensed to every recipient of that derivative work under the original license. (See GPL section 6 and if you think it through, there's simply no other way it could work.)

> BTW: It is considered impolite on linux-kernel to remove Cc's.

Really? On almost every other forum I know of, the rule is the reverse. It is rude to CC posts to people who are most likely on the list anyway.

DS

2007-09-17 00:57:31

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 05:29:56PM -0700, David Schwartz wrote:

>...
> Again, one more time:
>
> 1) You can obtain, from the GPL, the right to remove a BSD license notice.
>...

I hope noone believes this bullshit you are spreading.

When you incorporate BSD licenced code into a GPL'ed project it's
impossible that the GPL could give you any permission to remove the
BSD licence notice.

> > BTW: It is considered impolite on linux-kernel to remove Cc's.
>
> Really? On almost every other forum I know of, the rule is the reverse. It is rude to CC posts to people who are most likely on the list anyway.

linux-kernel is not "almost every other forum I know of".

Considering how long you are already trolling [1] on linux-kernel
I'm surprised you haven't heard about this before.

> DS

cu
Adrian

[1] Have you ever contributed any patch to the Linux kernel?

--

"Is there not promise of rain?" Ling Tan asked suddenly out
of the darkness. There had been need of rain for many days.
"Only a promise," Lao Er said.
Pearl S. Buck - Dragon Seed

2007-09-17 01:19:27

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 05:29:56PM -0700, David Schwartz wrote:
> In responses and posts, there is over and over a huge confusion
> between two completely different issues. One is about whether you
> can modify licenses, the other is about whether you can modify
> license *notices*.
>
> Again, one more time:
>
> 1) You can obtain, from the GPL, the right to remove a BSD license notice.
>
> 2) You can obtain, from the BSD license, the right to remove a GPL
> license notice.
>
> 3) Neither of these actions has any effect on the fact that these
> licenses still exist from the original author and still grant rights
> to anyone who comes into lawful possession of the work.
>
> Of course, if you take a dual-licensed file, remove the BSD notice,
> and then add more to it, those contributions can be offered *by*
> *their* *original* *authors* under only the GPL.

Careful; the devil is really in the details on this one. If you have
a file where all of the code was originally dual licensed (say, like
drivers/char/random.c, which was written by me and deliberately dual
licensed because I wanted other OS's to be able to use it), then this
might be true.

However, consider a file which was originally BSD licensed. Now
suppose it is modified (i.e., a derived work was created) and another
author slaps on a BSD/GPL dual notice. That's fine, so far; the BSD
license on the original file permits that. The new code is licensed
under either BSD or GPL (user's choice), and the original code is
under the BSD license, which is compatible with the GPL code, so
regardless of whether the user choose the BSD or GPL license.

However, in such a case it is **NOT** kosher to remove the BSD license
notification. Why? Because the lines of code from the original file
was originally licensed under the BSD only. The second author who
added the BSD/GPL'ed dual license only has the authority to release
the the code which he or she added under the BSD/GPL dual license.
The original code remains only licensed under the BSD license, but
that was OK because the BSD license is compatible with the GPL (but
not vice versa).

Now, in the case of the Atheros wireless code, the original author
(Sam Leffler) has stated that as far as *his* code was concerned, he
was willing to dual license it. However, in this case, he agreed to
have the code dual-licensed three years after the project was started.
He was amused and had no objections to people retroactively applying
the licensing changes to code that was 3 years old.[1]

HOWEVER, he can only speak for himself. If anyone in the first 3
years of the project made significant code contributions, they would
have reasonably expected them to be made under the BSD license, and
Sam's agreement to dual-license his code wouldn't apply to some other
major contributor. And if there is any code which was not written by
Sam contributed dring the first 3 years, then it could only be
distributed under the terms of the BSD license, regardless of Sam's
statements.

This may be one of the reasons why Eben said that very careful
research needs to be done before making any definitive statement on
the subject. Personally, my recommendation would just be to include
the original copyright statement (removing attribution is bad ju-ju)
and also to leave BSD permission statement in place. Yes, maybe after
doing a huge amount of research we might be able to determine that all
of the code belonged to Sam at the point when he agreed to dual
license it, but is it worth it to make 100% sure of this question?
Why not just leave the BSD statement in place, and be done with it.
We've done this before; for example, take a look at drivers/net/slhc.c
as evidence of the fact that we do have some BSD code in the Linux
kernel, and having the BSD permission notice really doesn't hurt
anyone.

[1] http://lkml.org/lkml/2007/9/1/160

- Ted

2007-09-17 01:35:50

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: RE: Wasting our Freedom

> On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 05:29:56PM -0700, David Schwartz wrote:
>
> >...
> > Again, one more time:
> >
> > 1) You can obtain, from the GPL, the right to remove a BSD
> > license notice.
> >...

> I hope noone believes this bullshit you are spreading.

How do you figure?

> When you incorporate BSD licenced code into a GPL'ed project it's
> impossible that the GPL could give you any permission to remove the
> BSD licence notice.

That's right. I never said otherwise. I did not say that under all conceivable circumstances, the GPL gives you the right to remove a BSD license notice.

The example I was talking about was a dual-licensed work. If you choose to make modifications under the GPL, then you are not obtaining any righst under the BSD license and are under no obligation to comply with its terms. In that case, the GPL gives you the right to remove the BSD license notice. (The license remains, of course, only the notice is gone.)

You are quite correct in the case of a BSD-only work. Since you still need the right to modify and distribute that work and can only get it from the BSD license, you must comply with the terms of the BSD license. One of those terms is not removing the license *notice*.

You are quite correct that if a work is offered under only the BSD license, the BSD license notice must remain in there forever, you cannot remove it because the license says you can't.

> > > BTW: It is considered impolite on linux-kernel to remove Cc's.
> >
> > Really? On almost every other forum I know of, the rule is the
> > reverse. It is rude to CC posts to people who are most likely on
> > the list anyway.

> linux-kernel is not "almost every other forum I know of".
>
> Considering how long you are already trolling [1] on linux-kernel
> I'm surprised you haven't heard about this before.

I find offensive your characterization of my attempt at honest debate as trolling.

> [1] Have you ever contributed any patch to the Linux kernel?

Yes, as a matter of fact. A long time ago, I contributed patches to allow the Sony CDU-535 driver to work as a module. For those who forgot, the Sony CDU-535 was one of the very first CD-ROM devices, almost 1X and with a proprietary interface -- an external drive that required a custom ISA card. For some reason, it's still there, though I find it hard to believe anyone has used it in years.

DS

2007-09-17 01:41:18

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: RE: Wasting our Freedom

Theodore Tso wrote:

Essentially, I agree with you. My only disagremeent with you is that I think
the problem starts sooner:

> However, consider a file which was originally BSD licensed. Now
> suppose it is modified (i.e., a derived work was created) and another
> author slaps on a BSD/GPL dual notice. That's fine, so far; the BSD
> license on the original file permits that. The new code is licensed
> under either BSD or GPL (user's choice), and the original code is
> under the BSD license, which is compatible with the GPL code, so
> regardless of whether the user choose the BSD or GPL license.

I would argue that it's really not so fine so far. You need to careful to
make sure that anybody who receives this file understands that they *must*
comply with the BSD license in addition to the GPL.

There choices are not "BSD or GPL" they are "BSD or BSD+GPL". They may
choose to comply with just the terms of the BSD license, or they may choose
to in addition require those who make further derivatives to comply with the
GPL *as* *well*.

But this is not really dual-licensed as you cannot choose just the GPL.

DS

2007-09-17 01:44:41

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 09:19:14PM -0400, Theodore Tso wrote:
>...
> Now, in the case of the Atheros wireless code, the original author
> (Sam Leffler) has stated that as far as *his* code was concerned, he
> was willing to dual license it. However, in this case, he agreed to
> have the code dual-licensed three years after the project was started.
> He was amused and had no objections to people retroactively applying
> the licensing changes to code that was 3 years old.[1]
>...

It's actually the other way round:

Sam changed the licence from dual 3-clause BSD and GPL to 2-clause BSD.

> - Ted

cu
Adrian

--

"Is there not promise of rain?" Ling Tan asked suddenly out
of the darkness. There had been need of rain for many days.
"Only a promise," Lao Er said.
Pearl S. Buck - Dragon Seed

2007-09-17 01:51:36

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 06:35:12PM -0700, David Schwartz wrote:
>
> > On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 05:29:56PM -0700, David Schwartz wrote:
> >
> > >...
> > > Again, one more time:
> > >
> > > 1) You can obtain, from the GPL, the right to remove a BSD
> > > license notice.
> > >...
>
> > I hope noone believes this bullshit you are spreading.
>
> How do you figure?
>
> > When you incorporate BSD licenced code into a GPL'ed project it's
> > impossible that the GPL could give you any permission to remove the
> > BSD licence notice.
>
> That's right. I never said otherwise. I did not say that under all conceivable circumstances, the GPL gives you the right to remove a BSD license notice.
>...

You did say otherwise.

Your claim was that "You can obtain, *from the GPL*, the right to remove
a BSD license notice."

This claim is bullshit.

You can get this right from the copyright holder, e.g. when he
dual-licenced his code, but you can not get this right from the GPL.

> DS

cu
Adrian

--

"Is there not promise of rain?" Ling Tan asked suddenly out
of the darkness. There had been need of rain for many days.
"Only a promise," Lao Er said.
Pearl S. Buck - Dragon Seed

2007-09-17 02:58:21

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

Daniel Hazelton wrote:
> On Sunday 16 September 2007 14:48:47 Can E. Acar wrote:
[snip]
>>
>> First, these developers got questionable advice from senior Linux kernel
>> developers, and SLFC (which is closely related to FSF) in the process.
>
> IIRC, the advice was "Yes, it is legal to choose to follow only one of
> multiple offered licenses on a project" - nothing else. They looked at the
> patches and said "Wait, you've changed the license on files that aren't under
> a dual license."
>
> Hence, no problems here - no questionable advice only.

The replies suggest that some (most?) people are not aware of the
recent developments, and that it is a dual licensing issue.

This has very little to do with dual licensing right now,
there has been other developments, more "advice" from SLFC.

The code in question is Reyk's open source HAL work.
I want to emphasize. This work was NOT ever dual licensed.

Furthermore, since it is compatible with the binary HAL from
Atheros, the interface is fixed and the same both in Linux and
*BSD. So, even the latst code divergence arguments do not
apply here. The improvements to this piece of code improve
the Open Source Atheros support, and is important for both
Linux and BSD.

Theo summarized the latest situation here, some days ago:

http://marc.info/?l=openbsd-misc&m=118963284332223&w=2

and here is a very brief summary:

http://marc.info/?l=openbsd-misc&m=118965266709012&w=2

If you really want to know the latest situation, please read these
links, and think about it.

Do you believe re-arranging code, renaming functions, splitting code
to multiple files, adding some adaptation code is original enough
to be a derivative work and deserve its own copyright?

Can

--
In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice.
But, in practice, there is.

2007-09-17 03:32:26

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

Can E. Acar wrote:
> Furthermore, since it is compatible with the binary HAL from
> Atheros, the interface is fixed and the same both in Linux and
> *BSD.

Hardly. It is software; the interface most definitely can and will change.

Jeff

2007-09-17 03:37:13

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: RE: Wasting our Freedom

> You did say otherwise.
>
> Your claim was that "You can obtain, *from the GPL*, the right to remove
> a BSD license notice."
>
> This claim is bullshit.

No, it's not.

> You can get this right from the copyright holder, e.g. when he
> dual-licenced his code, but you can not get this right from the GPL.

By that argument, the GPL never grants anyone any rights, they always come from the copyright holder. For dual-licensed code, it's the GPL that gives you the right to remove the BSD license notice.

The copyright holder says you may distribute and modify the code under either license. That doesn't let you remove the text of the other license by itself. For example, if both the BSD and the GPL licenses said you could not modify *any* license text, then you still couldn't remove the other license since neither one would give you that right.

However, both the GPL and the BSD license grant the right to modify. Neither requires you to keep any license notices intact except those that refer to that same license.

If you read the GPL carefully, you will see that it requires you to keep intact all notices that refer to *this* license, that is, the GPL. Similary, the BSD license requires you to keep the BSD license notice intact, but not any other licenses.

That is, the original author, by permitting you to obtain the right to modify his work from the GPL, has indirectly granted you the right to remove the BSD license. The GPL grants this right, and the author has permitted you to opt for that license.

DS

2007-09-17 05:33:37

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Sunday 16 September 2007 23:00:09 Can E. Acar wrote:
> Daniel Hazelton wrote:
> > On Sunday 16 September 2007 14:48:47 Can E. Acar wrote:
>
> [snip]
>
> >> First, these developers got questionable advice from senior Linux kernel
> >> developers, and SLFC (which is closely related to FSF) in the process.
> >
> > IIRC, the advice was "Yes, it is legal to choose to follow only one of
> > multiple offered licenses on a project" - nothing else. They looked at
> > the patches and said "Wait, you've changed the license on files that
> > aren't under a dual license."
> >
> > Hence, no problems here - no questionable advice only.
>
> The replies suggest that some (most?) people are not aware of the
> recent developments, and that it is a dual licensing issue.

Look at what I replied to and then thank me for replying to the text in
question. Or is the fact that I was responding to -
> >> First, these developers got questionable advice from senior Linux kernel
> >> developers, and SLFC (which is closely related to FSF) in the process.
- somehow beyond your comprehension?

> This has very little to do with dual licensing right now,
> there has been other developments, more "advice" from SLFC.

And I have seen absolutely none of said "advice".

> The code in question is Reyk's open source HAL work.
> I want to emphasize. This work was NOT ever dual licensed.

And that was only in question *PRIOR* to the review and rejection of the
patches in question. Comprende ?

> Furthermore, since it is compatible with the binary HAL from
> Atheros, the interface is fixed and the same both in Linux and
> *BSD. So, even the latst code divergence arguments do not
> apply here. The improvements to this piece of code improve
> the Open Source Atheros support, and is important for both
> Linux and BSD.

Doubtful. If I wrote a HAL implementation from scratch using Reyk's code as a
reference only would that make my bottom-up rewrite a derivative?

If you think it would, then you need to stop talking and start listening. Just
because the code needs to provide a specific interface does not mean that any
specific persons implementation is a derivative of another. This simple fact
is key - because if that fact wasn't true then the original, purely binary
HAL that was/is in FreeBSD would be illegal, as would Reyk's code.

> Theo summarized the latest situation here, some days ago:
>
> http://marc.info/?l=openbsd-misc&m=118963284332223&w=2
>
> and here is a very brief summary:
>
> http://marc.info/?l=openbsd-misc&m=118965266709012&w=2
>
> If you really want to know the latest situation, please read these
> links, and think about it.

No need. Here are the facts:
1) People have come to the Linux Kernel ML and complained about a set of
patches that were never accepted.
2) Theo has accused a Kernel developer of telling people to break the law.
3) People show up complaining again, apparently about the same patches.
4) One of them points out that the MadWifi developers have taken the broken
patches
5) Several people on LKML say "So go be a troll there, leave us alone"
6) The original people, and more, start with claims that the Linux Kernel
developers should "police" the "GNU/FSF/GPL Community"

And now you come here saying that people don't understand the situation.

Go look at the first two links in Theo's mails, which you linked to. Are they
to kernel.org git repo's? Is either of them for the "linux-wireless-2.6" git
repo?

The answer to both is "No" - they are to MadWifi - a system which is developed
separate from the Linux Kernel and not discussed here.

The other two links are to a git repo that hasn't been included in the Linux
Kernel, but probably will be, since it doesn't violate anyones copyright. Is
Theo happy? No. Because the two people that ported to code to work in Linux
have added themselves as holding copyrights to portions of the code.

"Those files are still invalidly being distributed -- Nick and Jiri did
not proveably do enough original work to earn copyright on a
derivative work, since their work is just an adaptation."

Now think about it - there are files that they have modified - in some cases
this was apparently quite a bit of work. Yet they can't place their own
copyrights on the code because Theo thinks it all is "Just an Adaptation" ?

Think about this: Linux runs on numerous hardware platforms. For each platform
there is a "port" - and "adaptation" of the code to make the kernel capable
of running as fast and as stably on the new platform as the original
supported one. Each one of those "ports" is an "adaptation" of existing code.
By Theo's reckoning - judging from the statement I've quoted - none of them
are worthy of a copyright, because they are "Just an adaptation".

For instance, compare src/sys/dev/ic/ar5xxx.h to ath5k.h (they appear to be
the same file) - there was a *LOT* of work done in this file. I truthfully
can't tell how much of the original remains and how much has been rewritten
or split out. But from the amount of work I can see in just *ONE* of the
files, I can find no reason for anyone to complain that the people that did
the work have "illegally" added themselves as copyright holders.

> Do you believe re-arranging code, renaming functions, splitting code
> to multiple files, adding some adaptation code is original enough
> to be a derivative work and deserve its own copyright?

No. But you apparently haven't looked at the code yourself. If you had you'd
see that a lot more than that was done - I haven't given the code a complete
review myself, but from what I have seen it isn't just a port.

DRH

--
Dialup is like pissing through a pipette. Slow and excruciatingly painful.

2007-09-17 06:42:10

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

Daniel Hazelton wrote:
> On Sunday 16 September 2007 23:00:09 Can E. Acar wrote:
[snip]
>> Theo summarized the latest situation here, some days ago:
>>
>> http://marc.info/?l=openbsd-misc&m=118963284332223&w=2
>>
>> and here is a very brief summary:
>>
>> http://marc.info/?l=openbsd-misc&m=118965266709012&w=2
>>
>> If you really want to know the latest situation, please read these
>> links, and think about it.
>
> No need. Here are the facts:

It is now obvious that you have no interest in facts,
You blindly repeat what you made yourself to believe.

I will waste no more time with you.

Can

--
In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice.
But, in practice, there is.

2007-09-17 07:36:46

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Monday 17 September 2007 02:43:50 Can E. Acar wrote:
> Daniel Hazelton wrote:
> > On Sunday 16 September 2007 23:00:09 Can E. Acar wrote:
>
> [snip]
>
> >> Theo summarized the latest situation here, some days ago:
> >>
> >> http://marc.info/?l=openbsd-misc&m=118963284332223&w=2
> >>
> >> and here is a very brief summary:
> >>
> >> http://marc.info/?l=openbsd-misc&m=118965266709012&w=2

BTW, I didn't say anything the last time, but the above mail is a load of
horse-shit. Theo is pointing fingers and making claims that anyone capable of
independent thought can see aren't related to reality.

Quoted in full (my comments are in the curly-braces):

I recognize that writeup about the Atheros / Linux / SFLC story is a
bit complex, so I wrote a very simple explanation to someone, and they
liked it's clarity so much that they asked me to post it for everyone.
Here it is (with a few more changes)

{Okay, this starts off good. Theo is going to make sure people understand what
is going on and what has happened. Perhaps he has realized things are
different from when he claimed that people were being advised to break the
law.}

-----
starting premise:

you can already use the code as it is

steps taken:

1. pester developer for a year to get it under another license.
- get told no, repeatedly

{Alright - not a problem here. Happens all the time}

2. climb over ethical fence

{Off the deep end already, but lets keep going...}

3. remove his license
- get caught, look a bit stupid

{Caught? Well, yeah. Caught by the Linux Kernel developers before it became a
real problem. This has been fixed, although the code still hasn't been added
to the core Kernel tree - and the current iteration still hasn't been offered
for review}

4. wrap his license with your own
- get caught, look really stupid

{Not done, although this was, apparently, suggested by the SFLC. Nice FUD
there, Theo.}

5. assert copyright under author's license, without original work
- get caught, look even more stupid

{Not done. Again, nice FUD there}

Right now the wireless linux developers -- aided by an entire team of
evidently unskilled lawyers -- are at step 5, and we don't know what
will happen next. We wait, to see what will happen.

{Theo, embrace reality. It'll solve all kinds of problems. It's a simple fact
that reality has split from Theo's view of things between numbers 3 and 4.
What has happened is that the licenses have been maintained and the two
people that have been working on it for the Linux kernel has added their own
copyrights - covering the code they have added. If someone outside the Linux
Kernel development team has followed the above path then there is no reason
to doubt that they have created problems for themselves.}

Reyk can take them to court over this, but he must do it before the
year 2047.

{While there are ways to handle the situation that don't involve lawsuits I
don't think this is the best solution. I don't know what avenues that Reyk
and the OpenBSD community have already tried, but from what I've been told
all that's been done is a "private" message to the MadWifi people that they
are violating a copyright. The rest has been flames and FUD on the Linux
Kernel ML - which solves nothing and just creates problems. Maybe if the
OpenBSD community slammed the MadWifi mailing lists over this instead of the
Linux Kernel ML the problem there would go away...}

> >> If you really want to know the latest situation, please read these
> >> links, and think about it.
> >
> > No need. Here are the facts:
>
> It is now obvious that you have no interest in facts,
> You blindly repeat what you made yourself to believe.

I believe the truth. All the facts I have are derived from the mail exchanges
I've witnessed. If you disagree with the facts as I understand them say so -
don't just say that I'm "making myself believe them". If I've made a mistake
in judging the facts from available evidence then let me know - and provide a
reference that shows where I made the mistake. (ie: a public e-mai, etc...)

Anyway...

The facts I stated could be shown from the LKML archives, but I believed you'd
have seen the same posts I have - almost all the relevant posts were in
threads that were CC'd to at least one of the OpenBSD ML's.

I dissected the logic presented and pointed out how *ALL* the arguments that
have been presented so far have been either handled - either by being shown
to be false or in the most logical (and legal) manner possible. But instead
of the most expected answer - that is, attacks on the core Linux Kernel
developers - ie: those that discuss development and exchange patches on LKML
stopping - Theo continues to stir up the trouble by claiming that *ALL* Linux
Kernel developers are making a concentrated attempt to "steal" code.

That is sheer and utter bullshit. I've finished a quick look through the
Atheros code in the git repo that Theo pointed out and don't see how
his "Just an Adaptation" argument works - there is more than enough new stuff
in all the files for those portions to qualify for a new copyright.
(although, truthfully, I think it should say "Portions Copyright xxx" and not
just a blanket statement - that *MIGHT* be what Theo is referring to...)

If the people working on the MadWifi project (the first two links in Theo
posted) have violated Reyk's copyright, then go after them. Flame their
mailing list(s) and bug them. And yes, I have been told that they
were "Privately Approached" - but that isn't what has been done here. You,
Theo and every other person that has spammed and flamed LKML over it don't
seem to understand one simple fact: MadWifi != Linux Kernel

As I've stated before - I don't use MadWifi, won't do a Linux install that
uses it and I make sure to tell everyone that asks about it not to use it.
Why? Well, for one I have never trusted it to be clear of problems like this
one and the other reason is - If it's so good, why haven't the developers
attempted to get it in the kernel?

Now, as I've said, I have only done a quick comparison of the "wireless-dev"
git tree and the Atheros code found in src/sys/dev/ic/ in the OpenBSD CVS
tree. So far I am still a bit unsure as to whether there is enough new code
to qualify for a copyright (the dozens of misc. changes and code reformatting
creates a lot of noise) but so far I'm pretty certain that the added stuff
does, in general, qualify. (IANAL and I'm not going to even guess what a
random court might think is "enough" - but my personal thought about "enough"
is more than 30 lines of code)

DRH

--
Dialup is like pissing through a pipette. Slow and excruciatingly painful.

2007-09-17 07:47:10

by Helge Hafting

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

Jacob Meuser wrote:
> On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 05:12:08PM -0400, Theodore Tso wrote:
>
>
>> reimplement them. Why don't you go and try asking NetApp for sources
>> to WAFL, and claim that they have "moral" duty to give the code back,
>> and see how quickly you get laughed out of the office?
>>
>
> which is _exactly_ what you guys are doing.
>
> so the linux community is morally equivilent to a corporation?
>
> that's what it sounds like you are all legally satisfied with.
>
A difference between linux and corporations: Linux actually
gives changed source code back - just not with a BSD licence on it.
So you can at least see what the linux community did, and do
the same. Although not by direct copying.

But why complain when the linux community do what the
BSD licence lets them? If you think the linux community
is abusing a loophole in the licence, why don't you just close
the hole? For example, require that changes made to your
code when used in the linux kernel must be made
available under a BSD licence also. Still possible to use
the code anywhere, but with a guarantee of getting stuff back.

Your problem seems to be with the BSD licence,
and the power to alter that licence lies in the BSD community.

Helge Hafting

2007-09-17 09:13:09

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

Hi!

On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 05:11:05PM -0400, Daniel Hazelton wrote:
>On Sunday 16 September 2007 16:39:26 Hannah Schroeter wrote:

>> On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 09:59:09PM +0200, Adrian Bunk wrote:
>> >On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 11:48:47AM -0700, Can E. Acar wrote:
>> >>...
>> >> First, these developers got questionable advice from senior Linux kernel
>> >> developers, and SLFC (which is closely related to FSF) in the process.

>> >The most questionable legal advice in this thread was by Theo de Raadt
>> >who claimed choosing one licence for _dual-licenced_ code was illegal...

>> JFTR, I do *not* think that that assessment was questionable. Unless the
>> dual-licensing *explicitly* allows relicensing, relicensing is forbidden
>> by copyright law. The dual-licensing allows relicensing only if that's
>> *explicitly* stated, either in the statement offering the alternative, or
>> in one of the licenses.

>That advice wasn't regarding relicensing. Dual-licensed code allows
>distribution and use under either license. If I get BSD/GPL code, I can
>follow the GPL exclusively and I don't have to follow the BSD license at all.
>And the alternative is also true. (ie: follow the BSD license exclusively and
>ignore the GPL)

>It's not "relicensing" - it's following *WHICH* of the offered terms are more
>agreeable.

The original issue *was* about illegal relicensing (i.e. not just
choosing which terms to follow, but removing the other terms
altogether).

>I'll just snip the rest, since you seem confused.

Refrain from personal attacks.

Regards,

Hannah.

2007-09-17 09:21:04

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

Hi!

On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 11:13:51PM +0200, Adrian Bunk wrote:
>On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 10:39:26PM +0200, Hannah Schroeter wrote:
>> On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 09:59:09PM +0200, Adrian Bunk wrote:
>> >On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 11:48:47AM -0700, Can E. Acar wrote:
>> >>...
>> >> First, these developers got questionable advice from senior Linux kernel
>> >> developers, and SLFC (which is closely related to FSF) in the process.

>> >The most questionable legal advice in this thread was by Theo de Raadt
>> >who claimed choosing one licence for _dual-licenced_ code was illegal...

>> JFTR, I do *not* think that that assessment was questionable. Unless the
>> dual-licensing *explicitly* allows relicensing, relicensing is forbidden
>> by copyright law. The dual-licensing allows relicensing only if that's
>> *explicitly* stated, either in the statement offering the alternative, or
>> in one of the licenses.

>Dual licenced code by definition explicitely states that you can choose
>the licence - otherwise it wouldn't be called dual-licenced.

It does state you can choose which terms to follow, indeed, of course.
But that does *not* imply removing the other terms altogether.

>> Neither GPL nor BSD/ISC allow relicensing in their well-known wordings.

>Noone said otherwise.

Removing the terms you choose not to follow in one instance *is*
relicensing.

>> If you think that's questionable, you should at least provide arguments
>> (and be ready to have your interpretation of the law and the licenses
>> tested before court).

>The licence in question was:

><-- snip -->

>/*-
> * Copyright (c) 2002-2004 Sam Leffler, Errno Consulting
> * All rights reserved.
> *
> * Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
> * modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions
> * are met:
> * 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright
> * notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer,
> * without modification.
> * 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce at minimum a disclaimer
> * similar to the "NO WARRANTY" disclaimer below ("Disclaimer") and any
> * redistribution must be conditioned upon including a substantially
> * similar Disclaimer requirement for further binary redistribution.
> * 3. Neither the names of the above-listed copyright holders nor the names
> * of any contributors may be used to endorse or promote products derived
> * from this software without specific prior written permission.
> *
> * Alternatively, this software may be distributed under the terms of the
> * GNU General Public License ("GPL") version 2 as published by the Free
> * Software Foundation.
> *
> * NO WARRANTY
> * ...

><-- snip -->

>Theo claimed it would "break the law" [1] to choose the GPL for
>_this_ code. [2]

I re-read Theo's mail and still think the factual issues Theo states are
probably right. Value judgements like "you should give code back" (when
the license doesn't require it) are of course debatable (I tend to agree
with Theo there too, but it's no mandatory requirement of course).

Theo did *not* claim it breaks the law if you choose to obey by the
terms of the GPL in said dual-licensing. Theo *did* claim (in my eyes,
probably rightfully, and if it should ever be needed with respect to
code related to OpenBSD, I could try to give a few bucks in support of
having that claim legally verified) it's illegal to remove the license
you chose to not follow in one instance of redistribution. IIRC the
softwarefreedom.org people involved agreed with Theo's assessment in
that instance.

>[...]

>> But the BSDl does not allow you to relicense the original code, even
>> while it allows you to license copyrightable additions/modifications
>> under different terms with few restrictions.

>> However, you say "regarding ethics" and just go back to the legal level.
>> Is it really ethical, if you consider both Linux and OpenBSD part of one
>> OSS "community", to share things only in one direction? To take the
>> reverse engineered HAL but to not allow OpenBSD to take some
>> modifications back?

>Is it really ethical to use a licence that does not require to give
>back, but then demand that something has to be given back?

IMO Theo didn't demand (as in try to enforce with legal pressure), but
state it'd be the *morally* right thing to do even if *not* legally
required (which isn't debated).

>Why don't you use a licence that expresses your intentions in a legally
>binding way?

Because BSD people don't want to enforce it in every thinkable case. And
BSD people don't want to enforce it using as much text as the GPL needs.

But still I think it'd be the (morally!) right thing to do with respect
to the Atheros HAL even if *not* legally bound to do so.

>[...]

>But the truth is a bit less harsh:

>In reality most Linux kernel developers might not mind to give back -
>and e.g. much of the ACPI code is BSD/GPL dual-licenced, and there
>doesn't seem to be any problem with this.

*nods* Why not the same for the Atheros code?

>But Theo's wrong accusations regarding dual licenced code might not be
>the best way for starting a fruitful collaboration...

As said above, the accusations, if you read them correctly, were not
wrong, but spot on right. Unless someone proves that dual-licensing as
in "you may follow terms A or terms B at your choice" implicitly implies
being allowed to remove A altogether should you choose B.

>[...]

Kind regards,

Hannah.

2007-09-17 09:37:13

by Henning Brauer

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

* [email protected] <[email protected]> [2007-09-17 02:29]:
> you claim that it's unethical for the linux community to use the code, but
> brag about NetApp useing the code. what makes NetApp ok and Linux evil?

NetApp does not pretend to be free and open and save the world etc

--
Henning Brauer, [email protected], [email protected]
BS Web Services, http://bsws.de
Full-Service ISP - Secure Hosting, Mail and DNS Services
Dedicated Servers, Rootservers, Application Hosting - Hamburg & Amsterdam

2007-09-17 11:18:20

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

Hello!

On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 05:12:08PM -0400, Theodore Tso wrote:
>[...]

>What is going on whenever someone changes a code is that they make a
>"derivative work".

Only if the additions/changes are significant enough to be copyrightable
on their own.

>Whether or not you can even make a derivative
>work, and under what terms the derivitive work can be licensed, is
>strictly up to the license of the original. For example, the BSD
>license says:

> Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
> modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions
> are met....

>Note the "with or without modification". This is what allows people
>to change BSD licensed code and redistribute said changes. The
>conditions specified by the BSD license do not mention anything about
>licening terms --- just that if you meet these three conditions, you
>are allowed to redistribute them. So for example, this is what allows
>Network Appliances to take BSD code, change it, and add a restrictive,
>proprietary copyright.

Right. You may add nearly any copyright *on your own significant
additions/changes*. However, BSD/ISC explicitly requires to retain the
BSD/ISC terms, too (applicable to the original part of the combined
work).

>So for code which is single-licensed under a BSD license, someone can
>create a new derived work, and redistribute it under a more
>restrictive license --- either one as restrictive as NetApp's (where
>no one is allowed to get binary unless they are a NetApp customer, or
>source only after signing an NDA), or a GPL license. It is not a
>relicencing, per se, since the original version of the file is still
>available under the original copyright; it is only the derived work
>which is under the more restrictive copyright.

No. The derivative work altogether has a *mixed* license. BSD/ISC for
the parts that are original, the other (restrictive, GPL, whatever)
license for the modifications/additions.

*If* you choose to distribute source along with the binaries, the part
of the source that's original is BSD/ISC licensed even in the derivative
work (though one may put *the additions/modifications* under restrictive
conditions, e.g. of commercial non-disclosure type source licensing).

>[... dual-licensing issues etc. already handled in other mails ...]

Kind regards,

Hannah.

2007-09-17 11:20:21

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

Hello!

On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 03:19:41PM -0700, David Schwartz wrote:
>[...]

>If you take work that's under a dual-license and remove one license notice
>from it when you create a derivative work, every recipient of that
>derivative work still receives a dual license from the original author to
>every protectable element still in the distributed work.

But you may *not* remove the license notices on GPL/BSD dual-licensed
works. *Both* forbid removing the licensing terms.

>[...]

>2) You can remove a BSD license notice from BSD-only code. (The BSD license
>prohibits this.)

The BSD license prohibits this anyway, regardless of whether BSD is the
only license or not (dual-licensing). Heck, copyright law itself forbids
it unless explicitly allowed.

>DS

Kind regards,

Hannah.

2007-09-17 11:50:34

by Jacob Meuser

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Mon, Sep 17, 2007 at 09:47:43AM +0200, Helge Hafting wrote:

> Your problem seems to be with the BSD licence,
> and the power to alter that licence lies in the BSD community.

I hope you can understand that this mentality is _exactly_ what has
some in the BSD community so upset.

when I see the linux community start to take credit for works they
did not create and I see the linux community respond to warnings
that people in the community are going overboard and jeopardizing
the linux community, which we do all benefit from, with a more or
less "whatever" attitude, it makes me sad. it would be like losing
a friend. I don't like losing friends, so I get vocal.

I don't understand why the linux community can't seem to say, "We
can accept BSD licensed code. There's no need to add the GPL to
it." and maybe even, "Although we strongly prefer the GPL,
respect for other licenses is every bit as important as respect
for the GPL."

I could be wrong, but I strongly believe that if the above was
truly accepted and believed by the community, the actions that
started and spread this whole debacle^Wdebate would not have
happened in the first place.

look, the GPL legally forces others to keep the same license.
the BSD community is asking the linux community do the same.
and when the linux community refuses, what do you expect the
recourse to be?

--
[email protected]
SDF Public Access UNIX System - http://sdf.lonestar.org

2007-09-17 11:58:18

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: RE: Wasting our Freedom

> On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 03:19:41PM -0700, David Schwartz wrote:
> >[...]
>
> >If you take work that's under a dual-license and remove one
> >license notice
> >from it when you create a derivative work, every recipient of that
> >derivative work still receives a dual license from the original author to
> >every protectable element still in the distributed work.

> But you may *not* remove the license notices on GPL/BSD dual-licensed
> works. *Both* forbid removing the licensing terms.

No, I'm sorry, this is not correct. The GPL gives you the right to remove
the BSD license. Read the GPL and please tell me where it says you must keep
the BSD license notice intact.

> >2) You can remove a BSD license notice from BSD-only code. (The
> >BSD license
> >prohibits this.)

> The BSD license prohibits this anyway, regardless of whether BSD is the
> only license or not (dual-licensing). Heck, copyright law itself forbids
> it unless explicitly allowed.

It doesn't matter that the BSD license prohibits it, its terms only apply to
you if you agree to it. Generally, you agree to it implicitly by doing
something that only the BSD license could give you the right to do, such as
modify or distribute a BSD-only work.

But in the case of a dual-licensed work, you can obtain the right to modify
or distribute it from the GPL. In that case, you can totally ignore anything
the BSD license says. You are under no obligation to comply with it.

As for copyright law prohibiting it, the GPL is quite clear about allowing
it. The GPL permits all modifications except those it specifically restricts
(and none of those rules would prohibit removing a BSD license). In fact,
the GPL specifically prohibits the imposition of "additional restrictions".

Copyright law permits you to impose all kinds of restrictions on what people
can do with your work. However, when you offer a work under the GPL, you
lose any right to insist that the work remain in any particular form or
contain any particular elements, except the GPL itself. The GPL grants
modification rights limited only by the restrictions in the GPL itself.

You cannot use any form of subterfuge to get something into a GPL-compatible
file that I cannot remove, by any means. (Other than the GPL license, of
course.) See GPL section 6.

DS

2007-09-17 12:06:38

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

Hello!

On Mon, Sep 17, 2007 at 04:57:29AM -0700, David Schwartz wrote:
>> On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 03:19:41PM -0700, David Schwartz wrote:
>> >[...]

>> >If you take work that's under a dual-license and remove one
>> >license notice
>> >from it when you create a derivative work, every recipient of that
>> >derivative work still receives a dual license from the original author to
>> >every protectable element still in the distributed work.

>> But you may *not* remove the license notices on GPL/BSD dual-licensed
>> works. *Both* forbid removing the licensing terms.

>No, I'm sorry, this is not correct. The GPL gives you the right to remove
>the BSD license. Read the GPL and please tell me where it says you must keep
>the BSD license notice intact.

Do *you* read the GPL and tell me where exactly it does *explicitly*
allow to change license notices at all. Ya know, that right is reserved
by law and must be *explicitly* granted. So just not explicitly
forbidding it isn't enough.

>[...]

>But in the case of a dual-licensed work, you can obtain the right to modify
>or distribute it from the GPL. In that case, you can totally ignore anything
>the BSD license says. You are under no obligation to comply with it.

>As for copyright law prohibiting it, the GPL is quite clear about allowing
>it. The GPL permits all modifications except those it specifically restricts
>(and none of those rules would prohibit removing a BSD license).

It permits modifications of the *work*, but not of the license.
(Re)Licensing is a *seperate* reserved right of copyright holders.

>[...]

>Copyright law permits you to impose all kinds of restrictions on what people
>can do with your work.

No. Copyright reserves rights. Copyright imposes *all* restrictions by
itself. You need to explicitly relinguish the restrictions for others to
be allowed to do just nearly *anything* (except fair use rights) with
the work.

>However, when you offer a work under the GPL, you
>lose any right to insist that the work remain in any particular form or
>contain any particular elements, except the GPL itself. The GPL grants
>modification rights limited only by the restrictions in the GPL itself.

It grants modification rights to the *work*, but not modification of
license (relicensing).

>You cannot use any form of subterfuge to get something into a GPL-compatible
>file that I cannot remove, by any means. (Other than the GPL license, of
>course.) See GPL section 6.

6. Each time you redistribute the Program (or any work based on the
Program), the recipient automatically receives a license from the
original licensor to copy, distribute or modify the Program subject to
these terms and conditions. You may not impose any further
restrictions on the recipients' exercise of the rights granted herein.
You are not responsible for enforcing compliance by third parties to
this License.

Now, the copyright holder hirself can exercise any rights anyway, as zie
doesn't need any license at all, anyway. And then, you just are not
allowed to restrict *rights granted herein*. But the *rights granted
herein* do not include relicensing (or where does the GPL explicitly
grant the right of relicensing?). So one *may* restrict relicensing.
In fact relicensing is restricted by "default" (law).

>DS

Kind regards,

Hannah.

2007-09-17 12:09:01

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: RE: Wasting our Freedom

Hannah Schroeter wrote:

> The original issue *was* about illegal relicensing (i.e. not just
> choosing which terms to follow, but removing the other terms
> altogether).

You are confusing two completely different issues. One is about removing
license notices, the other is about relicensing. One has nothing whatsoever
to do with the other.

No amount of changing license notices affects the license a recipient gets
to any code that the license changer did not contribute. You cannot, in the
sense of it being legally impossible, affect the license your recipients get
to code you did not author.

Relicensing is simply impossible under either the BSD license or the GPL
license. Neither grants you any relicensing rights.

Remove the BSD license from a dual-licensed work doesn't relicense anything.
Everyone who gets the work still gets a dual license from the original
author.

> It does state you can choose which terms to follow, indeed, of course.
> But that does *not* imply removing the other terms altogether.

Of course not. But since the GPL does not require you to keep a BSD license
notice intact and the BSD license does not require you to keep a GPL license
notice intact, the result is that you do have the right to remove the other
license's terms altogether. Note that this has no effect whatsoever on the
rights anyone actually gets. Rights come from licenses, not license notices.

If you were right, a dual-licensed work would not be GPL compatible. Since
the GPL prohibits the use of any mechanism to prohibit modification to the
work (other than the inability to remove the GPL itself).

> Removing the terms you choose not to follow in one instance *is*
> relicensing.

Umm, no. That's so obviously mind-bogglingly crazy that I don't even know
where to start. Let's try a hypothetical:

I download the entire Linux kernel and remove every single GPL license
notice and replace it with a public domain notice. I then distribute the
result. Am I relicensing the Linux kernel?

Isn't it obvious that I'm not. I *can't*. I have no right to change the
license under which other people's code is offered.

When you change a license notice, that has no effect on the actual license
anyone gets to anyone else's work. You license notice changes can only
affect licenses that *you* grant.

Nothing requires a license that exists to be documented in the accompanying
file. There is nothing in copyright law that is offended by the idea that
someone might remove a license notification even though the license still
applies so long as the license only *adds* rights.

The only reason we can't remove the GPL license from the Linux kernel is
because the GPL says so.

> As said above, the accusations, if you read them correctly, were not
> wrong, but spot on right. Unless someone proves that dual-licensing as
> in "you may follow terms A or terms B at your choice" implicitly implies
> being allowed to remove A altogether should you choose B.

You are confusing licenses with license notices. The GPL says you must keep
GPL license notices intact. Otherwise, it gives you complete freedom to
modify. This means that if you choose the GPL, you gain (from the GPL) the
right to remove the BSD license *NOTICE*.

This has no effect on anyone's substantive rights though. Removing license
notices has no effect on actual licenses.

DS

2007-09-17 12:10:40

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

"Can E. Acar" <[email protected]> writes:

> Do you believe re-arranging code, renaming functions, splitting code
> to multiple files, adding some adaptation code is original enough
> to be a derivative work and deserve its own copyright?

"Deserve"? The copyright is automatic, the author (of the
derivative work) may like it or not.
--
Krzysztof Halasa

2007-09-17 12:19:46

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Mon, Sep 17, 2007 at 01:18:05PM +0200, Hannah Schroeter wrote:
> >So for code which is single-licensed under a BSD license, someone can
> >create a new derived work, and redistribute it under a more
> >restrictive license --- either one as restrictive as NetApp's (where
> >no one is allowed to get binary unless they are a NetApp customer, or
> >source only after signing an NDA), or a GPL license. It is not a
> >relicencing, per se, since the original version of the file is still
> >available under the original copyright; it is only the derived work
> >which is under the more restrictive copyright.
>
> No. The derivative work altogether has a *mixed* license. BSD/ISC for
> the parts that are original, the other (restrictive, GPL, whatever)
> license for the modifications/additions.

Yes, agreed. I was being sloppy. In actual practice, the GPL is more
restrictive, aod so the terms of the GPL are what tend to have more
effect, but you are absolutely correct.

> *If* you choose to distribute source along with the binaries, the part
> of the source that's original is BSD/ISC licensed even in the derivative
> work (though one may put *the additions/modifications* under restrictive
> conditions, e.g. of commercial non-disclosure type source licensing).

Yes, although actually, the place where the BSD license must be
honored is in a binary distribution, since the BSD license and
copyright attribution must be distributed as part of the binary
distribution. (Even Microsoft does this when they use BSD code.)

For a source distribution, retaining the copyright attribution and
permission statement in the comments is sufficient to meet the BSD
license requirements, and since the open source world normally deals
mostly with source, we sometimes get sloppy with how we phrase things.

Regards,

- Ted

2007-09-17 12:37:18

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: RE: Wasting our Freedom

> Do *you* read the GPL and tell me where exactly it does *explicitly*
> allow to change license notices at all. Ya know, that right is reserved
> by law and must be *explicitly* granted. So just not explicitly
> forbidding it isn't enough.

You are mistaken about the law and mistaken about the GPL.

As far as the law goes, the GPL and BSD are not typical licenses. They do
not impose *any* restrictions on the use of the work. If you cite a law that
prohibits modifying or removing grants of additional rights, please do, but
I'll bet you can't do it.

I would agree there's probably a legal issue if you modify license text so
as to misrepresent to a person that they have rights they don't actually
have. But I don't think there's any legal obligation to inform people of all
the rights they might be able to get.

Note that the GPL is not a use license or EULA. It is an offer. If you
comply with it, you get additional rights. If you think you can find
something in copyright law that says you must put any offers of additional
rights that a person might be able to obtain to the work in the work, please
show me. But I'm 99.9999% sure no such thing exists because it's so absurd.

As for what the GPL says, read section 2 and 2c. The GPL is quite clear that
it permits all modifications except those it expressly prohibits. Nowhere
does it say you can remove a BSD license, but nowhere does it say you can
rename functions either.

> It permits modifications of the *work*, but not of the license.
> (Re)Licensing is a *seperate* reserved right of copyright holders.

I've already explained this to you several times but for some reason you
still don't get it. Modifying license *NOTICES* is not the same as modifying
the actual license. The whole relicensing thing is bogus. Nobody is talking
about relicensing anything.

> >Copyright law permits you to impose all kinds of restrictions on
> >what people
> >can do with your work.

> No. Copyright reserves rights. Copyright imposes *all* restrictions by
> itself. You need to explicitly relinguish the restrictions for others to
> be allowed to do just nearly *anything* (except fair use rights) with
> the work.

Right, and the GPL grants the right to modify and distribute subject only to
a very precisely laid out set of rules. You may not impose any restrictions
not found in the GPL.

> >However, when you offer a work under the GPL, you
> >lose any right to insist that the work remain in any particular form or
> >contain any particular elements, except the GPL itself. The GPL grants
> >modification rights limited only by the restrictions in the GPL itself.

> It grants modification rights to the *work*, but not modification of
> license (relicensing).

For the last time, modifying a license and relicensing are completely
different things. Your attempts to deliberately confuse them is getting
extremely tedious.

Let's try it one more time and maybe you'll finally understand it:

1) Relicensing. This is when a person other than the author of protectable
elements grants others rights to those elements normally reserved to the
author under copyright law. Neither the GPL nor the BSD license permit this.

2) Modify license notices. This is when a person changes the text of the
license in a file that contains protectably expression. This has no effect
on the actual license granted over any code the modifier did not author.

See? They are not the same thing. Modifying license notices and relicensing
are completely different issues. Nobody is relicensing because nobody can
relicense.

> >You cannot use any form of subterfuge to get something into a
> >GPL-compatible
> >file that I cannot remove, by any means. (Other than the GPL license, of
> >course.) See GPL section 6.
>
> 6. Each time you redistribute the Program (or any work based on the
> Program), the recipient automatically receives a license from the
> original licensor to copy, distribute or modify the Program subject to
> these terms and conditions. You may not impose any further
> restrictions on the recipients' exercise of the rights granted herein.
> You are not responsible for enforcing compliance by third parties to
> this License.

> Now, the copyright holder hirself can exercise any rights anyway, as zie
> doesn't need any license at all, anyway. And then, you just are not
> allowed to restrict *rights granted herein*. But the *rights granted
> herein* do not include relicensing (or where does the GPL explicitly
> grant the right of relicensing?). So one *may* restrict relicensing.
> In fact relicensing is restricted by "default" (law).

Sure, relicenseing is impossible. There is no need to restrict it as the GPL
already prohibits it. In section 6 which you quote above, do you see the
"from the original licensor" part? There is no relicensing under either the
GPL or the BSD license. It is impossible. Not prohibited, *impossible*.

However, the GPL permits modification of license notices, other than the
GPL. It is very important to the integrity of the GPL that people not be
able to smuggle things into GPL'd files that others cannot remove. This
includes foreign license notices.

DS

2007-09-17 12:57:17

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Mon, Sep 17, 2007 at 11:30:11AM +0200, Henning Brauer wrote:
> * [email protected] <[email protected]> [2007-09-17 02:29]:
> > you claim that it's unethical for the linux community to use the code, but
> > brag about NetApp useing the code. what makes NetApp ok and Linux evil?
>
> NetApp does not pretend to be free and open and save the world etc

GPL and BSD are two different philosophies of freedom.

Some people (e.g. me) consider the BSD licence a less free licence
since it doesn't defend that the code stays free.

Some people consider the BSD licence more free since NetApp or Linux or
Microsoft can take your code and never gove back.

Although I don't agree with it, I can understand the rationale of the
latter.

But stating in your licence that noone has to give back but then
complaining to some people on ethical grounds that they should give
back is simply dishonest.

Is your intention to allow people to include your code into GPL'ed code
and never give back, or is your intention that this shouldn't happen?

And whatever your intention is should be stated in your licence.

cu
Adrian

--

"Is there not promise of rain?" Ling Tan asked suddenly out
of the darkness. There had been need of rain for many days.
"Only a promise," Lao Er said.
Pearl S. Buck - Dragon Seed

2007-09-17 13:02:50

by Claudio Jeker

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 05:12:08PM -0400, Theodore Tso wrote:
> On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 10:39:26PM +0200, Hannah Schroeter wrote:
> > >The most questionable legal advice in this thread was by Theo de Raadt
> > >who claimed choosing one licence for _dual-licenced_ code was illegal...
> >
> > JFTR, I do *not* think that that assessment was questionable. Unless the
> > dual-licensing *explicitly* allows relicensing, relicensing is forbidden
> > by copyright law. The dual-licensing allows relicensing only if that's
> > *explicitly* stated, either in the statement offering the alternative, or
> > in one of the licenses.
> >
> > Neither GPL nor BSD/ISC allow relicensing in their well-known wordings.
> >
> > If you think that's questionable, you should at least provide arguments
> > (and be ready to have your interpretation of the law and the licenses
> > tested before court).
>
> Hannah,
>
> What is going on whenever someone changes a code is that they make a
> "derivative work". Whether or not you can even make a derivative
> work, and under what terms the derivitive work can be licensed, is
> strictly up to the license of the original. For example, the BSD
> license says:
>
> Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
> modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions
> are met....
>
> Note the "with or without modification". This is what allows people
> to change BSD licensed code and redistribute said changes. The
> conditions specified by the BSD license do not mention anything about
> licening terms --- just that if you meet these three conditions, you
> are allowed to redistribute them. So for example, this is what allows
> Network Appliances to take BSD code, change it, and add a restrictive,
> proprietary copyright.
>
> So for code which is single-licensed under a BSD license, someone can
> create a new derived work, and redistribute it under a more
> restrictive license --- either one as restrictive as NetApp's (where
> no one is allowed to get binary unless they are a NetApp customer, or
> source only after signing an NDA), or a GPL license. It is not a
> relicencing, per se, since the original version of the file is still
> available under the original copyright; it is only the derived work
> which is under the more restrictive copyright.
>

Wohoho! Slow here please. NDA have nothing to do with licenses and
especially with copyright. NetApp even though their stuff is under their
copyright and license does hopefully not modify the copyrights of imported
BSD/ISC code. That would be against the law and I hope their leagal
departement is smart enough to not do this mistake especially because the
BSD license those not hinder them in any way.

Now comes the funny part, as the BSD code in NetApp is available
from public sources -- for example from OpenBSD -- it is actually not
covered by the NDA. NDAs can only cover information that is not
publicly available -- you can only forbit disclosure of information that
is secret in the first place.

Finally most companies know they benefit from open source and give often
the code changes most likely bugfixes to this imported code back.
Unlike most GPL people we're happy with that especially we do not require
them to release any of their own code. Sure their WAFL file system is cool
but even in my wildest dreams I would not require them to publish their
code just because the used some of my code.
--
:wq Claudio

2007-09-17 13:12:20

by Jason Dixon

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Sep 17, 2007, at 8:57 AM, Adrian Bunk wrote:

> On Mon, Sep 17, 2007 at 11:30:11AM +0200, Henning Brauer wrote:
>> * [email protected] <[email protected]> [2007-09-17 02:29]:
>>> you claim that it's unethical for the linux community to use the
>>> code, but
>>> brag about NetApp useing the code. what makes NetApp ok and Linux
>>> evil?
>>
>> NetApp does not pretend to be free and open and save the world etc
>
> GPL and BSD are two different philosophies of freedom.
>
> Some people (e.g. me) consider the BSD licence a less free licence
> since it doesn't defend that the code stays free.

Sure it does. My code under BSD license continues to remain free,
regardless of what Company X(1) does with their *copy* of my code.
The only restrictions on my code is that copyright and attribution
must remain intact. All users of my code have the same rights,
regardless of what Company X does with their *copy*.

The GPL places additional restrictions on code. It is therefore less
free than the BSD.

Free code + restrictions = non-free code.

(1) GPL advocates deep-down really like the BSD license.
Unfortunately, they keep getting hung up on the idea of the Evil
Corporation (TM) "stealing" my code. Nobody has stolen anything.
That corporation is entitled to the same rights as Joe User. Neither
EC or JU are required to redistribute any of their changes to their
*copy* of my code. They are only required to keep attribution
intact. Does that make MY CODE any less free? OF COURSE NOT!

---
Jason Dixon
DixonGroup Consulting
http://www.dixongroup.net

2007-09-17 13:19:41

by Hans J. Koch

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

Am Montag 17 September 2007 15:15 schrieb Jason Dixon:

>
> The GPL places additional restrictions on code. It is therefore less
> free than the BSD.
>
> Free code + restrictions = non-free code.

The legal restriction that people must not enter your house uninvited
by smashing the door adds to your freedom, don't you think so?

Hans

2007-09-17 13:28:01

by Sean

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Mon, 17 Sep 2007 09:15:31 -0400
Jason Dixon <[email protected]> wrote:

> Sure it does. My code under BSD license continues to remain free,
> regardless of what Company X(1) does with their *copy* of my code.
> The only restrictions on my code is that copyright and attribution
> must remain intact. All users of my code have the same rights,
> regardless of what Company X does with their *copy*.
>
> The GPL places additional restrictions on code. It is therefore less
> free than the BSD.
>
> Free code + restrictions = non-free code.
>
> (1) GPL advocates deep-down really like the BSD license.
> Unfortunately, they keep getting hung up on the idea of the Evil
> Corporation (TM) "stealing" my code. Nobody has stolen anything.
> That corporation is entitled to the same rights as Joe User. Neither
> EC or JU are required to redistribute any of their changes to their
> *copy* of my code. They are only required to keep attribution
> intact. Does that make MY CODE any less free? OF COURSE NOT!

Your post is incredibly ironic considering how up in arms all the
BSD folks are right now. Many of them claiming that their code
is being "stolen".

Instead of worrying about Evil Corporation "stealing" their code,
they're worrying about Evil GPL folks "stealing". Why don't you
take a moment to email them with a reminder that whatever GPL group X
does with their *copy*, all users of the code have the same rights.
If they really believe in the BSD license they will then calm down
and we can all go back to work.

Regards,
S.

2007-09-17 13:29:00

by David Newall

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

Jacob Meuser wrote:
> when I see the linux community start to take credit for works they
> did not create and I see the linux community respond to warnings
> that people in the community are going overboard and jeopardizing
> the linux community, which we do all benefit from, with a more or
> less "whatever" attitude, it makes me sad. it would be like losing
> a friend. I don't like losing friends, so I get vocal.
>

All very nicely said.

I'd like to add that an insult implicit in the attempt to remove the BSD
license is that it says to the original authors, "we plan to improve
this code, and when we do you'll never again be able to ship it as
BSD." They weren't the words, but that's what you get when you think to
the future.

Although opinions seem still to be divided, I think everyone has been
reminded that just because you can doesn't mean you should.

> I don't understand why the linux community can't seem to say,

The one shining light in this whole sorry Atheros saga is that it's now
all history; the only people still talking about it are people not
directly involved. The matter could now rest...

2007-09-17 13:34:17

by Jason Dixon

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Sep 17, 2007, at 9:27 AM, Sean <[email protected]> wrote:

> On Mon, 17 Sep 2007 09:15:31 -0400
> Jason Dixon <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>> Sure it does. My code under BSD license continues to remain free,
>> regardless of what Company X(1) does with their *copy* of my code.
>> The only restrictions on my code is that copyright and attribution
>> must remain intact. All users of my code have the same rights,
>> regardless of what Company X does with their *copy*.
>>
>> The GPL places additional restrictions on code. It is therefore less
>> free than the BSD.
>>
>> Free code + restrictions = non-free code.
>>
>> (1) GPL advocates deep-down really like the BSD license.
>> Unfortunately, they keep getting hung up on the idea of the Evil
>> Corporation (TM) "stealing" my code. Nobody has stolen anything.
>> That corporation is entitled to the same rights as Joe User. Neither
>> EC or JU are required to redistribute any of their changes to their
>> *copy* of my code. They are only required to keep attribution
>> intact. Does that make MY CODE any less free? OF COURSE NOT!
>
> Your post is incredibly ironic considering how up in arms all the
> BSD folks are right now. Many of them claiming that their code
> is being "stolen".

They did not KEEP ATTRIBUTION INTACT.

---
Jason Dixon
DixonGroup Consulting
http://www.dixongroup.net

2007-09-17 13:35:29

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Mon, Sep 17, 2007 at 02:55:54PM +0200, Claudio Jeker wrote:
> Wohoho! Slow here please. NDA have nothing to do with licenses and
> especially with copyright. NetApp even though their stuff is under their
> copyright and license does hopefully not modify the copyrights of imported
> BSD/ISC code. That would be against the law and I hope their leagal
> departement is smart enough to not do this mistake especially because the
> BSD license those not hinder them in any way.

Yes, NDA doesn't have anything to do with license and copyrights, and
I never said that NetApp is modfying a copyright; but they *are*
putting a proprietary copyright license on their modifications ---
which is exactly what the Linux wireless developers had proposed to do
(modulo mistakes about removing copyright notices and attribution
which have already been acknowledged and fixed), except instead of
using a proprietary license which means you'll never see the WAFL
sources (at least without signing an NDA and acknowledging their
proprietary copyright license over their changes), it will be under a
GPL license with which you have philosophical differences, but still
allows you to see the source.

> Finally most companies know they benefit from open source and give often
> the code changes most likely bugfixes to this imported code back.
> Unlike most GPL people we're happy with that especially we do not require
> them to release any of their own code. Sure their WAFL file system is cool
> but even in my wildest dreams I would not require them to publish their
> code just because the used some of my code.

So why are you complaining when people want to use some of your code
and put the combined work under a mixed BSD/GPL license? You can't
use WAFL; you can't use the GPL'ed enhancements. What's the
difference between those two cases? Somehow a mixed BSD/Proprietary
license is better?

- Ted

2007-09-17 13:38:41

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Mon, Sep 17, 2007 at 11:20:19AM +0200, Hannah Schroeter wrote:
> Hi!

Hi Hannah!

> On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 11:13:51PM +0200, Adrian Bunk wrote:
> >On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 10:39:26PM +0200, Hannah Schroeter wrote:
> >> On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 09:59:09PM +0200, Adrian Bunk wrote:
> >> >On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 11:48:47AM -0700, Can E. Acar wrote:
> >> >>...
> >> >> First, these developers got questionable advice from senior Linux kernel
> >> >> developers, and SLFC (which is closely related to FSF) in the process.
>
> >> >The most questionable legal advice in this thread was by Theo de Raadt
> >> >who claimed choosing one licence for _dual-licenced_ code was illegal...
>
> >> JFTR, I do *not* think that that assessment was questionable. Unless the
> >> dual-licensing *explicitly* allows relicensing, relicensing is forbidden
> >> by copyright law. The dual-licensing allows relicensing only if that's
> >> *explicitly* stated, either in the statement offering the alternative, or
> >> in one of the licenses.
>
> >Dual licenced code by definition explicitely states that you can choose
> >the licence - otherwise it wouldn't be called dual-licenced.
>
> It does state you can choose which terms to follow, indeed, of course.
> But that does *not* imply removing the other terms altogether.

On which legal grounds do you base this statement?

And if you choose the GPL the code you distribute will be under the GPL
*only* forever [1], so what value would be in shipping terms that are
void?

And if the author intended to have the BSD licence text kept intact when
his code gets incorporated into GPL'ed code, why didn't he simply make
his code BSD-only? In fact the only difference between BSD-only code and
BSD/GPL dual-licenced code is that you can't remove the BSD licence text
for the former when incorporating it into GPL'ed code...

> >> Neither GPL nor BSD/ISC allow relicensing in their well-known wordings.
>
> >Noone said otherwise.
>
> Removing the terms you choose not to follow in one instance *is*
> relicensing.

If anything can be called relicencing, then the act of choosing one of
the licence. And this happens one level above the actual licences, and
the licence texts don't matter for this act.

> >> If you think that's questionable, you should at least provide arguments
> >> (and be ready to have your interpretation of the law and the licenses
> >> tested before court).
>
> >The licence in question was:
>
> ><-- snip -->
>
> >/*-
> > * Copyright (c) 2002-2004 Sam Leffler, Errno Consulting
> > * All rights reserved.
> > *
> > * Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
> > * modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions
> > * are met:
> > * 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright
> > * notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer,
> > * without modification.
> > * 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce at minimum a disclaimer
> > * similar to the "NO WARRANTY" disclaimer below ("Disclaimer") and any
> > * redistribution must be conditioned upon including a substantially
> > * similar Disclaimer requirement for further binary redistribution.
> > * 3. Neither the names of the above-listed copyright holders nor the names
> > * of any contributors may be used to endorse or promote products derived
> > * from this software without specific prior written permission.
> > *
> > * Alternatively, this software may be distributed under the terms of the
> > * GNU General Public License ("GPL") version 2 as published by the Free
> > * Software Foundation.
> > *
> > * NO WARRANTY
> > * ...
>
> ><-- snip -->
>
> >Theo claimed it would "break the law" [1] to choose the GPL for
> >_this_ code. [2]
>
> I re-read Theo's mail and still think the factual issues Theo states are
> probably right. Value judgements like "you should give code back" (when
> the license doesn't require it) are of course debatable (I tend to agree
> with Theo there too, but it's no mandatory requirement of course).
>
> Theo did *not* claim it breaks the law if you choose to obey by the
> terms of the GPL in said dual-licensing. Theo *did* claim (in my eyes,
> probably rightfully, and if it should ever be needed with respect to
> code related to OpenBSD, I could try to give a few bucks in support of
> having that claim legally verified) it's illegal to remove the license
> you chose to not follow in one instance of redistribution. IIRC the
> softwarefreedom.org people involved agreed with Theo's assessment in
> that instance.

You confuse two completely different situations.

The SFLC talks about how to incorporate *not* dual-licenced
BSD-only code into GPL'ed code.

> >[...]
>
> >> But the BSDl does not allow you to relicense the original code, even
> >> while it allows you to license copyrightable additions/modifications
> >> under different terms with few restrictions.
>
> >> However, you say "regarding ethics" and just go back to the legal level.
> >> Is it really ethical, if you consider both Linux and OpenBSD part of one
> >> OSS "community", to share things only in one direction? To take the
> >> reverse engineered HAL but to not allow OpenBSD to take some
> >> modifications back?
>
> >Is it really ethical to use a licence that does not require to give
> >back, but then demand that something has to be given back?
>
> IMO Theo didn't demand (as in try to enforce with legal pressure), but
> state it'd be the *morally* right thing to do even if *not* legally
> required (which isn't debated).
>
> >Why don't you use a licence that expresses your intentions in a legally
> >binding way?
>
> Because BSD people don't want to enforce it in every thinkable case. And
> BSD people don't want to enforce it using as much text as the GPL needs.
>
> But still I think it'd be the (morally!) right thing to do with respect
> to the Atheros HAL even if *not* legally bound to do so.

It's not about lazyness of BSD developers, many people who consider the
BSD licence more free than the GPL argue that the advantage of the BSD
licence is that it does not require you to give back.

Something is wrong if your licence text clearly states that you do not
require getting anything back but you then argue on moral grounds that
something has to be given back.

The majority of Linux developers might have never read the complete GPL
text, and the same might be true for some licence expressing the
intentions of the OpenBSD developers. But it would document in a legal
binding way the intentions of the OpenBSD developers.

> >[...]
>
> >But the truth is a bit less harsh:
>
> >In reality most Linux kernel developers might not mind to give back -
> >and e.g. much of the ACPI code is BSD/GPL dual-licenced, and there
> >doesn't seem to be any problem with this.
>
> *nods* Why not the same for the Atheros code?

I don't know the background of this one, but besides the already
expressed point that it wouldn't bring you much for technical reasons
(the Linux code will quickly switch to Linux conventions), there might
be better ways for starting a collaboration than Theo's rants.

> >But Theo's wrong accusations regarding dual licenced code might not be
> >the best way for starting a fruitful collaboration...
>
> As said above, the accusations, if you read them correctly, were not
> wrong, but spot on right. Unless someone proves that dual-licensing as
> in "you may follow terms A or terms B at your choice" implicitly implies
> being allowed to remove A altogether should you choose B.

As said above, keeping void terms neither makes sense, nor does there
seem to be any legal requirement.

> >[...]
>
> Kind regards,
>
> Hannah.

cu
Adrian

[1] the original code is of course still dual licence

--

"Is there not promise of rain?" Ling Tan asked suddenly out
of the darkness. There had been need of rain for many days.
"Only a promise," Lao Er said.
Pearl S. Buck - Dragon Seed

2007-09-17 13:39:37

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

Hannah Schroeter <[email protected]> writes:

> Right. You may add nearly any copyright *on your own significant
> additions/changes*.

Such as a patch? Hardly IMHO, a patch is not a work but an output
of an automated tool. The copyright is not about fragments of works.

You may add a copyright _notice_, not a copyright (a right).
The author of a derived work automatically has copyright to the
whole derived work, not only to the "fragments" he has created.
MS Windows is "Copyright Microsoft", not "Microsoft and others".

You can add any licence (not copyright, as it's automatic) to your
(derived or not) work. If it's a derived work, you must comply with
the original licence(s).

Of course, the original work is copyrighted by its original author
and licenced under its original conditions, and nobody is able to
change that.

Now, you don't need a licence from the original author to use
the derived work. The author of the derived work only needs
a licence from the original author to create a derived work.
Do you think Microsoft users have licences from authors of
the works MS Windows etc. are based on? :-)

You do need a licence from the original author to use the original
work, e.g. unmodified original work distributed by third party.
I.e., you don't need a licence to use MS Windows from the retail
shop, you need it from MS.

Is it that hard to understand?

> However, BSD/ISC explicitly requires to retain the
> BSD/ISC terms, too (applicable to the original part of the combined
> work).

Where exactly?
Have you seen MS EULA maybe?
Such requirement would be impossible to fullfit.

> No. The derivative work altogether has a *mixed* license. BSD/ISC for
> the parts that are original, the other (restrictive, GPL, whatever)
> license for the modifications/additions.

Look at MS EULA, does MS Windows in your opinion have such a mixed
licence too? :-)
--
Krzysztof Halasa

2007-09-17 13:42:49

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Mon, Sep 17, 2007 at 09:33:52AM -0400, Jason Dixon wrote:
> On Sep 17, 2007, at 9:27 AM, Sean <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>> On Mon, 17 Sep 2007 09:15:31 -0400
>> Jason Dixon <[email protected]> wrote:
>>
>>> Sure it does. My code under BSD license continues to remain free,
>>> regardless of what Company X(1) does with their *copy* of my code.
>>> The only restrictions on my code is that copyright and attribution
>>> must remain intact. All users of my code have the same rights,
>>> regardless of what Company X does with their *copy*.
>>>
>>> The GPL places additional restrictions on code. It is therefore less
>>> free than the BSD.
>>>
>>> Free code + restrictions = non-free code.
>>>
>>> (1) GPL advocates deep-down really like the BSD license.
>>> Unfortunately, they keep getting hung up on the idea of the Evil
>>> Corporation (TM) "stealing" my code. Nobody has stolen anything.
>>> That corporation is entitled to the same rights as Joe User. Neither
>>> EC or JU are required to redistribute any of their changes to their
>>> *copy* of my code. They are only required to keep attribution
>>> intact. Does that make MY CODE any less free? OF COURSE NOT!
>>
>> Your post is incredibly ironic considering how up in arms all the
>> BSD folks are right now. Many of them claiming that their code
>> is being "stolen".
>
> They did not KEEP ATTRIBUTION INTACT.

This was a mistake in one patch that had never been merged, and this
mistake has been corrected once it was discovered.

> Jason Dixon

cu
Adrian

--

"Is there not promise of rain?" Ling Tan asked suddenly out
of the darkness. There had been need of rain for many days.
"Only a promise," Lao Er said.
Pearl S. Buck - Dragon Seed

2007-09-17 15:21:51

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: RE: Wasting our Freedom

Theodore Tso writes:

> Now, you don't need a licence from the original author to use
> the derived work. The author of the derived work only needs
> a licence from the original author to create a derived work.
> Do you think Microsoft users have licences from authors of
> the works MS Windows etc. are based on? :-)

Of course you don't need a license to *use* the derived work. You never need
a license to use a work. (In the United States. Some countries word this a
bit differently but get the same effect.)

If, however, you wanted to get the right to modify or distribute a
derivative work, you would need to obtain the rights to every protectable
element in that work. If the work were under a GPL or BSD type license, only
the original author of each individual element could grant you such a
license.

Read GPL section 6, particularly this part: "Each time you redistribute the
Program (or any work based on the Program), the recipient automatically
receives a license from the original licensor to copy, distribute or modify
the Program subject to
these terms and conditions."

To distribute a derivative work that contains protectable elements from
multiple authors, you are distributing all of those elements and need the
rights to all of them. You need a license to each element and in the absence
of any relicensing arrangements (which the GPL and BSD license are not),
only the original author can grant that to you.

It is a common confusion that just because the final author has copyright in
the derivative work, that means he can license the work. He cannot license
anyone else's creative contributions absent a relicensing arrangement.

The GPL is explicit that it is not such a license. That's what the "from the
original licensor" language in section 6 means. The BSD license is not
explicit, but it couldn't work any other way.

When you receive a Linux kernel distribution, you receive a GPL license to
every protectable element in that work from that element's individual
author. Nobody can license the kernel as a whole to you.

DS

2007-09-17 15:25:40

by Paul de Weerd

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Mon, Sep 17, 2007 at 03:38:45PM +0200, Adrian Bunk wrote:
| It's not about lazyness of BSD developers, many people who consider the
| BSD licence more free than the GPL argue that the advantage of the BSD
| licence is that it does not require you to give back.
|
| Something is wrong if your licence text clearly states that you do not
| require getting anything back but you then argue on moral grounds that
| something has to be given back.

Something is wrong if your licence text clearly states that you MUST
give back, but then you don't return the favour on grounds that "hey,
they don't require it, so we don't have to".

It may be perfectly legal, but it's "interesting" to say the least.
No, you do not have to give back. But weren't you open source / free
software developers ? Why did you pick the GPL ? Because you didn't
want someone to run of with your code ? You wanted code to be given
back ? Why not do it yourself ? By not giving back you're giving a
strange signal.

Paul 'WEiRD' de Weerd

PS: Yes, I know .. but your "giving back" attaches new strings that
weren't there in the first place.

--
>++++++++[<++++++++++>-]<+++++++.>+++[<------>-]<.>+++[<+
+++++++++++>-]<.>++[<------------>-]<+.--------------.[-]
http://www.weirdnet.nl/

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2007-09-17 15:26:18

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: RE: Wasting our Freedom

> And if you choose the GPL the code you distribute will be under the GPL
> *only* forever [1], so what value would be in shipping terms that are
> void?

Not true. You cannot chose the license that applies to other people's code. The code you distribute contains protectable elements from different authors. Each element is still offered under whatever license the original author offered it under.

You cannot affect the license grant from the author to the lawful possessor of code you did not author.

The code you *contribute* will be under the GPL *only* forever. But the code you distribute will contain elements from different authors offered under different licenses.

> And if the author intended to have the BSD licence text kept intact when
> his code gets incorporated into GPL'ed code, why didn't he simply make
> his code BSD-only? In fact the only difference between BSD-only code and
> BSD/GPL dual-licenced code is that you can't remove the BSD licence text
> for the former when incorporating it into GPL'ed code...

That's true.

DS

2007-09-17 15:38:42

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Mon, Sep 17, 2007 at 05:15:05PM +0200, Paul de Weerd wrote:
> On Mon, Sep 17, 2007 at 03:38:45PM +0200, Adrian Bunk wrote:
> | It's not about lazyness of BSD developers, many people who consider the
> | BSD licence more free than the GPL argue that the advantage of the BSD
> | licence is that it does not require you to give back.
> |
> | Something is wrong if your licence text clearly states that you do not
> | require getting anything back but you then argue on moral grounds that
> | something has to be given back.
>
> Something is wrong if your licence text clearly states that you MUST
> give back, but then you don't return the favour on grounds that "hey,
> they don't require it, so we don't have to".
>...

The GPL doesn't require to give back under a licence that gives less
protection for the code than the GPL does.

If you take the BSD licence seriously you don't request to get anything
back on moral grounds.

If you take the GPL seriously you don't want your modifications being
available with less protection.

In reality, where it makes sense technically, it's quite likely that an
author will make his modifications, or even a completely self-written
driver, also available under the terms of the BSD licence when asked in
a friendly way.

> Paul 'WEiRD' de Weerd
>...

cu
Adrian

--

"Is there not promise of rain?" Ling Tan asked suddenly out
of the darkness. There had been need of rain for many days.
"Only a promise," Lao Er said.
Pearl S. Buck - Dragon Seed

2007-09-17 16:18:41

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Mon, Sep 17, 2007 at 08:25:14AM -0700, David Schwartz wrote:
>
> > And if you choose the GPL the code you distribute will be under the GPL
> > *only* forever [1], so what value would be in shipping terms that are
> > void?
>
> Not true. You cannot chose the license that applies to other people's code. The code you distribute contains protectable elements from different authors. Each element is still offered under whatever license the original author offered it under.
>
> You cannot affect the license grant from the author to the lawful possessor of code you did not author.
>
> The code you *contribute* will be under the GPL *only* forever. But the code you distribute will contain elements from different authors offered under different licenses.
>...

The licence text we are talking about disagrees with what you claim:

<-- snip -->

/*-
* Copyright (c) 2002-2004 Sam Leffler, Errno Consulting
* All rights reserved.
*
* Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
* modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions
* are met:
* 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright
* notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer,
* without modification.
* 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce at minimum a disclaimer
* similar to the "NO WARRANTY" disclaimer below ("Disclaimer") and any
* redistribution must be conditioned upon including a substantially
* similar Disclaimer requirement for further binary redistribution.
* 3. Neither the names of the above-listed copyright holders nor the names
* of any contributors may be used to endorse or promote products derived
* from this software without specific prior written permission.
*
* Alternatively, this software may be distributed under the terms of the
* GNU General Public License ("GPL") version 2 as published by the Free
* Software Foundation.
*
* NO WARRANTY
* ...

<-- snip -->

We are talking about dual-licenced code, not about BSD licenced code
incorporated into GPL'ed code.

That other people can distribute the original dual-licenced code
dual-licenced or BSD-only, and that you can get the code under this
licences from there, is without a doubt. But *the author* allowed me to
choose the licence when *I distribute it*.

> DS

cu
Adrian

--

"Is there not promise of rain?" Ling Tan asked suddenly out
of the darkness. There had been need of rain for many days.
"Only a promise," Lao Er said.
Pearl S. Buck - Dragon Seed

2007-09-17 17:14:25

by Eric Furman

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Wasting My Time (was Re: Wasting our Freedom)

deleting this stupid thread...

2007-09-17 18:02:43

by Paul de Weerd

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Mon, Sep 17, 2007 at 05:38:46PM +0200, Adrian Bunk wrote:
| > Something is wrong if your licence text clearly states that you MUST
| > give back, but then you don't return the favour on grounds that "hey,
| > they don't require it, so we don't have to".
| >...
|
| The GPL doesn't require to give back under a licence that gives less
| protection for the code than the GPL does.

It does not, I may not have been explicit but this is what I was
alluding to. It was, in fact, what I was pointing out. Your preferred
licence doesn't require it, so you don't do it. [and by you, I do not
mean you in person]

| If you take the BSD licence seriously you don't request to get anything
| back on moral grounds.

I do take the BSD licence serious and I do not request to get anything
back on any BSD-grounds (moral, legal, other). I was referring to the
GPL's "you must share" attitude that isn't reciprocal.

I'm not making any arguments against any (commercial) user of BSD
licenced code on moral (or legal or other) grounds that they should
give back. I am (and I think others too, but I do not wish to speak
for them) trying to make an argument based on the 'share'-nature of
the GPL that doesn't give back the freedom of BSD licenced code.

| If you take the GPL seriously you don't want your modifications being
| available with less protection.

If you have respect for both licences and you don't want your code
available with less protection, rewrite. BSD developers have done so
for various GPL licenced programs. After having used GPL licenced code
for some time, some developer decides that he prefers another licence
and does a rewrite. Linux Kernel Developers have it easier in this
respect. They do not have to rewrite - they can take BSD licenced code
and use it in their kernel without changing the licence or needing a
rewrite [or so I've understood - IANAL].

If you use someone else's code, show this fellow free software / open
source developer some respect and give back as freely as you received.
This respect is enforced in the GPL, the BSD doesn't even mention it.
BSD folks tend to have lots of respect for good code and they try to
respect licences [not making any observations about other folks or
other subjects here, this is based on my personal observations]

I'm clearly not saying you must give back, legally [but still, IANAL].
I'm saying you should give back as freely as you received, out of
respect. Someone else already mentioned it : Just because you can take
BSD licenced code and do (almost) whatever you wish, doesn't mean you
should. Leave that up to the Big Evil Corps (the ones that also use
GPL'ed code without giving back, btw).

| In reality, where it makes sense technically, it's quite likely that an
| author will make his modifications, or even a completely self-written
| driver, also available under the terms of the BSD licence when asked in
| a friendly way.

This, of course, would be perfect. But in all fairness, why then
release anything under the GPL ? Please, don't get me wrong, I respect
the GPL and the Linux kernel and especially each developers choice of
licence, but I doubt it's that easy (of course, on a case-by-case
basis, there's nothing to lose).

Cheers,

Paul 'WEiRD' de Weerd

--
>++++++++[<++++++++++>-]<+++++++.>+++[<------>-]<.>+++[<+
+++++++++++>-]<.>++[<------------>-]<+.--------------.[-]
http://www.weirdnet.nl/

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2007-09-17 18:35:46

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Mon, Sep 17, 2007 at 08:02:30PM +0200, Paul de Weerd wrote:
> On Mon, Sep 17, 2007 at 05:38:46PM +0200, Adrian Bunk wrote:
> | > Something is wrong if your licence text clearly states that you MUST
> | > give back, but then you don't return the favour on grounds that "hey,
> | > they don't require it, so we don't have to".
> | >...
> |
> | The GPL doesn't require to give back under a licence that gives less
> | protection for the code than the GPL does.
>
> It does not, I may not have been explicit but this is what I was
> alluding to. It was, in fact, what I was pointing out. Your preferred
> licence doesn't require it, so you don't do it. [and by you, I do not
> mean you in person]
>
> | If you take the BSD licence seriously you don't request to get anything
> | back on moral grounds.
>
> I do take the BSD licence serious and I do not request to get anything
> back on any BSD-grounds (moral, legal, other). I was referring to the
> GPL's "you must share" attitude that isn't reciprocal.
>
> I'm not making any arguments against any (commercial) user of BSD
> licenced code on moral (or legal or other) grounds that they should
> give back. I am (and I think others too, but I do not wish to speak
> for them) trying to make an argument based on the 'share'-nature of
> the GPL that doesn't give back the freedom of BSD licenced code.

GPL has a "share and protect" nature.

> | If you take the GPL seriously you don't want your modifications being
> | available with less protection.
>
> If you have respect for both licences and you don't want your code
> available with less protection, rewrite. BSD developers have done so
> for various GPL licenced programs. After having used GPL licenced code
> for some time, some developer decides that he prefers another licence
> and does a rewrite. Linux Kernel Developers have it easier in this
> respect. They do not have to rewrite - they can take BSD licenced code
> and use it in their kernel without changing the licence or needing a
> rewrite [or so I've understood - IANAL].
>
> If you use someone else's code, show this fellow free software / open
> source developer some respect and give back as freely as you received.
> This respect is enforced in the GPL, the BSD doesn't even mention it.
> BSD folks tend to have lots of respect for good code and they try to
> respect licences [not making any observations about other folks or
> other subjects here, this is based on my personal observations]
>
> I'm clearly not saying you must give back, legally [but still, IANAL].
> I'm saying you should give back as freely as you received, out of
> respect. Someone else already mentioned it : Just because you can take
> BSD licenced code and do (almost) whatever you wish, doesn't mean you
> should. Leave that up to the Big Evil Corps (the ones that also use
> GPL'ed code without giving back, btw).

If a corporation violates the terms of the GPL lawyers and courts can
force them to do so.

BSD people tend to consider the BSD licence as being more free than the
GPL because it allows to take without having to give back.

When people then demand getting code back based on "ethics" or "morale"
they are using the wrong licence.

Your licence puts you in the position that you always depend on the
goodwill of the persons from whom you want to get code back.

And BTW:
Many contributions to the Linux kernel come from people payed by
Big Evil Corps. [1]

> | In reality, where it makes sense technically, it's quite likely that an
> | author will make his modifications, or even a completely self-written
> | driver, also available under the terms of the BSD licence when asked in
> | a friendly way.
>
> This, of course, would be perfect. But in all fairness, why then
> release anything under the GPL ? Please, don't get me wrong, I respect
> the GPL and the Linux kernel and especially each developers choice of
> licence, but I doubt it's that easy (of course, on a case-by-case
> basis, there's nothing to lose).

First of all, for some developers it wouldn't make a difference whether
their code was published under the terms of the GPL or under the terms
of the BSD licence.

And there are many people who are aware when code comes from *BSD and
that giving code back in these cases would be friendly.

I for one consider it important that the Linux kernel is protected by
the GPL - but whether some contribution I send also becomes available
under a different licence I don't care that much.

> Cheers,
>
> Paul 'WEiRD' de Weerd

cu
Adrian

[1] http://lwn.net/Articles/222773/

--

"Is there not promise of rain?" Ling Tan asked suddenly out
of the darkness. There had been need of rain for many days.
"Only a promise," Lao Er said.
Pearl S. Buck - Dragon Seed

2007-09-17 19:24:59

by Claudio Jeker

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Mon, Sep 17, 2007 at 09:34:58AM -0400, Theodore Tso wrote:
> On Mon, Sep 17, 2007 at 02:55:54PM +0200, Claudio Jeker wrote:
> > Wohoho! Slow here please. NDA have nothing to do with licenses and
> > especially with copyright. NetApp even though their stuff is under their
> > copyright and license does hopefully not modify the copyrights of imported
> > BSD/ISC code. That would be against the law and I hope their leagal
> > departement is smart enough to not do this mistake especially because the
> > BSD license those not hinder them in any way.
>
> Yes, NDA doesn't have anything to do with license and copyrights, and
> I never said that NetApp is modfying a copyright; but they *are*
> putting a proprietary copyright license on their modifications ---
> which is exactly what the Linux wireless developers had proposed to do
> (modulo mistakes about removing copyright notices and attribution
> which have already been acknowledged and fixed), except instead of
> using a proprietary license which means you'll never see the WAFL
> sources (at least without signing an NDA and acknowledging their
> proprietary copyright license over their changes), it will be under a
> GPL license with which you have philosophical differences, but still
> allows you to see the source.
>

You assume a lot about what NetApp did. While they can use BSD licensed
code in their system without any issue they can not slam a new copyright
on that code unless the changes create a derivative work.
If you just do an adaption of the code you have no right to add an
additional copyright. You need to make substantial extensions to the
original work. Now adapting code to make it run under linux is in my
opinion not a substantial work. It can be compared to translate a book to
a different language -- which neither allows you to assign copyright on
the result.
I very much doubt that WAFL is a simple adaption of UFS/FFS. So it should
be clear that this work has it's own copyright. Maybe some parts of their
code is using BSD work that they just adapted. On that code they can not
add an additional copyright as the modifications are not substantial
enough.

> > Finally most companies know they benefit from open source and give often
> > the code changes most likely bugfixes to this imported code back.
> > Unlike most GPL people we're happy with that especially we do not require
> > them to release any of their own code. Sure their WAFL file system is cool
> > but even in my wildest dreams I would not require them to publish their
> > code just because the used some of my code.
>
> So why are you complaining when people want to use some of your code
> and put the combined work under a mixed BSD/GPL license? You can't
> use WAFL; you can't use the GPL'ed enhancements. What's the
> difference between those two cases? Somehow a mixed BSD/Proprietary
> license is better?
>

Because they put their copyright plus license on code that they barely
modified. If they would have added substantial work into the OpenHAL code
and by doing that creating something new I would not say much.

All the comercial code I have ever seen did not do this stunt of adding a
new copyright and license to barely modified files. Perhaps the "evil"
companies have more ethics or better understanding of copyright.

--
:wq Claudio

2007-09-17 19:27:58

by Paul de Weerd

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Mon, Sep 17, 2007 at 08:32:35PM +0200, Adrian Bunk wrote:
| > I'm not making any arguments against any (commercial) user of BSD
| > licenced code on moral (or legal or other) grounds that they should
| > give back. I am (and I think others too, but I do not wish to speak
| > for them) trying to make an argument based on the 'share'-nature of
| > the GPL that doesn't give back the freedom of BSD licenced code.
|
| GPL has a "share and protect" nature.

Yes, and I was talking about the 'share' part. The protect part is
fine with me, I understand the reasoning behind it. I would not choose
it as my own licence, but that is a matter of personal choice.

| > I'm clearly not saying you must give back, legally [but still, IANAL].
| > I'm saying you should give back as freely as you received, out of
| > respect. Someone else already mentioned it : Just because you can take
| > BSD licenced code and do (almost) whatever you wish, doesn't mean you
| > should. Leave that up to the Big Evil Corps (the ones that also use
| > GPL'ed code without giving back, btw).
|
| If a corporation violates the terms of the GPL lawyers and courts can
| force them to do so.

The exact same is true for the BSD Licence. If a corporation (or
anyone else for that matter) violates the terms of the BSD licence,
courts can make them stop these violations. It's just easier to
violate the GPL, because it has more restrictions. [I'm still not a
lawyer, btw]

Big Evil Corps can however use GPL'ed code without giving back and
without violating the GPL. Also the same as with the BSD licence.

| BSD people tend to consider the BSD licence as being more free than the
| GPL because it allows to take without having to give back.
|
| When people then demand getting code back based on "ethics" or "morale"
| they are using the wrong licence.

Why ? BSD people give their code away for free. They put hard work
into writing quality software and they have their own ethics or
morale. They do not *demand* getting code back, at least I have not
seen any indication of such demands. So then why are they using the
wrong licence ? I was merely pointing out a matter of mutual respect.

| Your licence puts you in the position that you always depend on the
| goodwill of the persons from whom you want to get code back.

And the people using the BSD licence are completely aware of this [I
assume, again I do not wish to speak for anyone but myself]. At least
I was surprised that fellow open source / free software developers are
not giving back. I've come to expect this from certain companies, but
to me the free and open software community as a whole (here I'm
lumping everyone and their mother together, I know) should have some
respect towards eachother and the licence they choose and acknowledge
the contributions of other parties, giving back as freely as they've
been given. Not because it is required but because it's just right.

The GPL requires I give changes I distribute back under the same
licence. But if I ever were to change such a program, I would not give
these changes back because of this requirement but because it just
makes sense.

| And BTW:
| Many contributions to the Linux kernel come from people payed by
| Big Evil Corps. [1]

There's also contributions to OpenBSD from people paid by Big Evil
Corps. The same is true for Net- and FreeBSD. Of course, not all Big
Evil Corps are, in fact, Evil.

| First of all, for some developers it wouldn't make a difference whether
| their code was published under the terms of the GPL or under the terms
| of the BSD licence.
|
| And there are many people who are aware when code comes from *BSD and
| that giving code back in these cases would be friendly.

Of course, like I said, on a case-by-case basis, there's nothing to
lose.

Paul 'WEiRD' de Weerd

--
>++++++++[<++++++++++>-]<+++++++.>+++[<------>-]<.>+++[<+
+++++++++++>-]<.>++[<------------>-]<+.--------------.[-]
http://www.weirdnet.nl/

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2007-09-17 19:50:47

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Mon, Sep 17, 2007 at 08:20:39AM -0700, David Schwartz wrote:
>
> Theodore Tso writes:
>
> > Now, you don't need a licence from the original author to use
> > the derived work. The author of the derived work only needs
> > a licence from the original author to create a derived work.
> > Do you think Microsoft users have licences from authors of
> > the works MS Windows etc. are based on? :-)

I didn't write the above; please be careful with your attributions.

- Ted

2007-09-17 20:35:47

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

"David Schwartz" <[email protected]> writes:

> Theodore Tso writes:

hardly

> Of course you don't need a license to *use* the derived work. You never need
> a license to use a work. (In the United States. Some countries word this a
> bit differently but get the same effect.)

Really? I thought you need a licence to use, say, MS Windows.
Even to possess a copy. But I don't know about USA, I'm told
there are strange things happening there :-)

> If, however, you wanted to get the right to modify or distribute a
> derivative work, you would need to obtain the rights to every protectable
> element in that work.

Of course.

> Read GPL section 6, particularly this part: "Each time you redistribute the
> Program (or any work based on the Program), the recipient automatically
> receives a license from the original licensor to copy, distribute or modify
> the Program subject to
> these terms and conditions."

Seems fine, your point?
In addition to the rights from you (to the whole derived work),
the recipient receives rights to the original work, from original
author.
It makes perfect sense, making sure the original author can't sue
you like in the SCO case.

If A sold a BSD licence to B only and this B sold a proprietary
licence (for a derived work) to C, C (without that clause) wouldn't
have a BSD licence to the original work. This is BTW common scenario.

> To distribute a derivative work that contains protectable elements from
> multiple authors, you are distributing all of those elements and need the
> rights to all of them. You need a license to each element and in the absence
> of any relicensing arrangements (which the GPL and BSD license are not),
> only the original author can grant that to you.

Of course.

BTW: a work by multiple authors is a different thing than a work
derived from another.

> It is a common confusion that just because the final author has copyright in
> the derivative work, that means he can license the work.

Of course he (and only he) can. It doesn't mean the end users can't
receive additional rights.

Come on, licence = promise not to sue. Why would the copyright
holder be unable to promise not to sue? It just doesn't make sense.

> He cannot license
> anyone else's creative contributions absent a relicensing arrangement.

Sure, he can licence only his work, perhaps derived work.

Look at MS Windows - it's a work created by a single company, though
derived from other works, it's (C) MS and you get a licence for the
whole MS Windows from only MS.

You may have some additional rights and MS may have to acknowledge
additional contributors, based on their licences granted by those
contributors (such as using the original UCB licence).
--
Krzysztof Halasa

2007-09-17 20:43:37

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Mon, Sep 17, 2007 at 09:23:41PM +0200, Claudio Jeker wrote:
> Because they put their copyright plus license on code that they barely
> modified. If they would have added substantial work into the OpenHAL code
> and by doing that creating something new I would not say much.

Number 1, some of the Linux wireless developers screwed up earlier
versions. No denying that, the problems were pointed out during the
patch reviewed problem, AND THEY WERE FIXED.

Number 2, if you take a look at their latest set of changes (which
have still not been accepted), the HAL code is under a pure BSD
license (ath5k_hw.c). Other portions are dual licensed, but not the
HAL --- if people would only take a look at

http://git.kernel.org/?p=linux/kernel/git/linville/wireless-dev.git;a=tree;f=drivers/net/wireless;h=2d6caeba0924c34b9539960b9ab568ab3d193fc8;hb=everything

And yet, the BSD folks seem to continue to nurse the above mantra
(which was true, but quickly corrected) combined with the "and the
Linux folks aren't listening", which is manifestly not true. We might
not agree with everything you are saying, and we might think you're
being highly hypocritical, but we are listening.

> All the comercial code I have ever seen did not do this stunt of adding a
> new copyright and license to barely modified files. Perhaps the "evil"
> companies have more ethics or better understanding of copyright.

In the original BSD 4.3 code, if I recall correctly, /bin/true was 12
lines of AT&T copyright and the standard "this is proprietary
non-published trade secret" legalease with the standard threats of
bazillions and bazillions of damage due to AT&T's irreparable harm if
the file was ever disclosed.... followed by "exit 0". :-)

Personally, I find that issues of copyright are much more easily
discussed if people keep a sense of balance and humor.

- Ted

2007-09-17 21:16:05

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: RE: Wasting our Freedom

Kryzstof Halasa writes:

> "David Schwartz" <[email protected]> writes:
>
> > Theodore Tso writes:
>
> hardly

A apologize for the error in attribution.

> > Of course you don't need a license to *use* the derived work.
> > You never need
> > a license to use a work. (In the United States. Some countries
> > word this a
> > bit differently but get the same effect.)

> Really? I thought you need a licence to use, say, MS Windows.
> Even to possess a copy. But I don't know about USA, I'm told
> there are strange things happening there :-)

No, you do not need a license to use MS Windows. Microsoft may choose to
compel you to agree to a license in exchange for allowing you to install a
copy, but that is not quite the same thing.

If you read United States copyright law, you will see that *use* is not one
of the rights reserved to the copyright holder. Every lawful possessor of a
work may use it in the ordinary way, assuming they did not *agree* to some
kind of restriction.

> > If, however, you wanted to get the right to modify or distribute a
> > derivative work, you would need to obtain the rights to every
> > protectable
> > element in that work.

> Of course.

> > Read GPL section 6, particularly this part: "Each time you
> > redistribute the
> > Program (or any work based on the Program), the recipient automatically
> > receives a license from the original licensor to copy,
> > distribute or modify
> > the Program subject to
> > these terms and conditions."

> Seems fine, your point?

My point is that you *cannot* prevent a recipient of a derivative work from
receiving any rights under either the GPL or the BSD to any protectable
elements in that work.

> In addition to the rights from you (to the whole derived work),
> the recipient receives rights to the original work, from original
> author.
> It makes perfect sense, making sure the original author can't sue
> you like in the SCO case.
>
> If A sold a BSD licence to B only and this B sold a proprietary
> licence (for a derived work) to C, C (without that clause) wouldn't
> have a BSD licence to the original work. This is BTW common scenario.

C most certainly would have a BSD license, should he choose to comply with
terms, to every protectable element that is in both the original work and
the work he received.

C has no right to license any protectable element he did not author to
anyone else. He cannot set the license terms for those elements to C.

Again, read GPL section 6. (And this is true for the BSD license as well, at
least in the United States, because it's the only way such a license could
work.)

Neither the BSD nor the GPL ever give you the right to change the actual
license a work is offered under by the original author. In fact, they could
not give you this right under US copyright law. Modify the license *text* is
not the same thing as modifying the license.

> > To distribute a derivative work that contains protectable elements from
> > multiple authors, you are distributing all of those elements
> > and need the
> > rights to all of them. You need a license to each element and
> > in the absence
> > of any relicensing arrangements (which the GPL and BSD license are not),
> > only the original author can grant that to you.

> Of course.
>
> BTW: a work by multiple authors is a different thing than a work
> derived from another.

In practice it doesn't matter. All that matters is that you have a single
fixed form or expression that contains creative elements contributed by
different people potentially under different licenses. The issues of whether
it's a derivative work or a combined work and whether the distributor has
made sufficient protectable elements to assert their own copy really has no
effect on any of the issues that matter here.

> > It is a common confusion that just because the final author has
> > copyright in
> > the derivative work, that means he can license the work.

> Of course he (and only he) can. It doesn't mean the end users can't
> receive additional rights.

No, he can't. He can only license those protectable elements that he
authored.

There is no way you can license protectable elements authored by another
absent a relicenseing agreement. The GPL is explicitly not a relicensing
agreement, see section 6. The BSD license is implicitly not a relicensing
agreement.

> Come on, licence = promise not to sue. Why would the copyright
> holder be unable to promise not to sue? It just doesn't make sense.

A license is not just a promise not to sue, it's an *enforceable*
*committment* not to sue. It's an explicit grant of permission against legal
rights.

Would you argue that I can license Disney's "The Lion King" movie to you if
I promise not to sue you over any (no) rights that I possess to it?

> > He cannot license
> > anyone else's creative contributions absent a relicensing arrangement.
>
> Sure, he can licence only his work, perhaps derived work.

Right.

> Look at MS Windows - it's a work created by a single company, though
> derived from other works, it's (C) MS and you get a licence for the
> whole MS Windows from only MS.

You are confusing licenses of two very different types. The BSD and GPL
licenses only cover modification and distribution, two rights you do not get
to MS Windows at all. *Use* is not restricted under copyright.

You are comparing apples to oranges.

It is misleading to say you "get a license for the whole MS Windows from
only MS". You do not need a license to *USE* a copyrighted work in the
United States. You only need a license to copy, distribute, or modify the
work. These are rights you *never* *get* to MS Windows.

There is simply nothing remotely comparable to the BSD or GPL license in the
case of MS Windows. There is no grant of additional rights beyond those you
get automatically with lawful possession (such as use).

Licenses that only grant additional rights and do not restrict use, such as
the GPL and BSD license, are not remotely comparable to EULAs or
shrink/click wrap agreements. They follow completely different rules and are
basically incomparable.

If MS wished to grant someone the right to modify or redistribute Windows,
that person would also need to obtain the right to modify or distribute
protectable elements not authored by Microsoft. The only way they could
obtain those rights, assuming Microsoft didn't have written relicensing
agreements, is from the original author under the original licenses.

DS

2007-09-17 22:04:49

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

Theodore Tso wrote:
> On Mon, Sep 17, 2007 at 09:23:41PM +0200, Claudio Jeker wrote:
>> Because they put their copyright plus license on code that they barely
>> modified. If they would have added substantial work into the OpenHAL code
>> and by doing that creating something new I would not say much.
>
> Number 1, some of the Linux wireless developers screwed up earlier
> versions. No denying that, the problems were pointed out during the
> patch reviewed problem, AND THEY WERE FIXED.

Not all, see below:

> Number 2, if you take a look at their latest set of changes (which
> have still not been accepted), the HAL code is under a pure BSD
> license (ath5k_hw.c). Other portions are dual licensed, but not the
> HAL --- if people would only take a look at
>
> http://git.kernel.org/?p=linux/kernel/git/linville/wireless-dev.git;a=tree;f=drivers/net/wireless;h=2d6caeba0924c34b9539960b9ab568ab3d193fc8;hb=everything
>

from latest ath5k_hw.c:

* Copyright (c) 2004-2007 Reyk Floeter <[email protected]>
* Copyright (c) 2006-2007 Nick Kossifidis <[email protected]>
* Copyright (c) 2007 Jiri Slaby <[email protected]>
[snip rest of BSD license]

The only remaining issue is whether Nick & Jiri have enough
original contributions to the code to be added to the Copyright.

I believe this needs to be resolved between Reyk and Nick and Jiri.

The main reason of Theo's message, linked earlier, was the
lack of response on this issue. It seems that the SFLC is
dismissing this issue, and thus stalling its resolution by the
developers.

The rest is, as you say, history.

Can

--
In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice.
But, in practice, there is.

2007-09-17 22:10:10

by Ingo Schwarze

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

Adrian Bunk wrote on Mon, Sep 17, 2007 at 02:57:14PM +0200:

> But stating in your licence that noone has to give back but then
> complaining to some people on ethical grounds that they should give
> back is simply dishonest.
>
> Is your intention to allow people to include your code into GPL'ed code
> and never give back, or is your intention that this shouldn't happen?
>
> And whatever your intention is should be stated in your licence.

As this is a recurring argument in the present discussion, let's
address it, even though it lies somewhat beside the main topic.
What i wish and what i try to enforce by legal contracts are two
completely different things. In particular, it is _not_ a smart
idea to try to enforce all one's wishes by legal means.

For example, i wish that as much as possible of the code i write be
freely available such that others can use it, too, and i wish that
others write useful code and make it free such that i can use it.
When i publish code, i wish bugfixes to be fed back to me, and i
hope that others might free their derivative works, too. Besides,
i might hope that people at large behave in human and rational ways
and refrain from doing harm to others. In particular i might wish
the fruits of my work not to be abused to harm or oppress people.
Quite probably, lots of software developers share similar wishes,
whatever licenses they happen to be employing.

But this doesn't imply i should be putting any of the above into
the license for my code. Once people attach additional conditions
to their licences, sooner or later i get stuck when trying to
combine different code covered by different licences. However well
intentioned, in practice, those additional conditions habitually
turn out to be incompatible - even when, regarded seperately, all
of them might appear to make some sense.

Now doubtless, the two main additional conditions imposed by the GPL -
derivative works may only be distributed if they are made as open and
as free as the original - are among those making the most sense of all
the additional conditions you might imagine, in the sense that nearly
any developer of free software will wish that anybody holding the
copyright on a derivative work would make that free. Still, when
trying to combine code with different licences, even the GPL at times
turns out to be a bother. This does not only apply to the case of
non-free closed-source commercial code, but also to cases where
authors intended to make their code free, but, be it by inexperience
or because they failed to restrain themselves, unfortunately added
some uncommon condition to the license. Combining such code with ISC
or BSD code is hardly ever problem, combining such code with GPL code
may well be.

Thus, even when wishing derivative works to be free in their turn,
i still see a strong theoretical and a strong practical argument to
choose the ISC license over the GPL: Theoretically, it's just the
categorical imperative: If everybody would be adding her or his
favorite condition to her or his license, we would not end up in
free software, but in chaos. Practically, i'm quite fed up with
GPL license incompatibility issues always popping up at the most
inconvenient places, and still more, with all those license
compatibility discussions. With the ISC license, there are no
incompatibility issues and no incompatibility discussions, it just
works. Of course, i lose the option to sue people to open up
derivative works, but i keep the hope that some people (especially
those engaged in free software themselves) understand and keep up
the spirit, and above all, i avoid lots of legalese worries.
Ultimately, it's kind of a trade-off.

To summarize, there are valid reasons to wish that people would make
derivative works free, but to not require it in the license. Just
like there are valid reasons to wish that people should not use the
code for waging war, but to not require that in the license.

2007-09-17 23:35:51

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

"David Schwartz" <[email protected]> writes:

> My point is that you *cannot* prevent a recipient of a derivative work from
> receiving any rights under either the GPL or the BSD to any protectable
> elements in that work.

Of course you can.
What rights do you have to BSD-licenced works, made available
(under BSD) to MS exclusively? You only get the binary object...

You know, this is quite common practice - instead of assigning
copyright, you can grant a BSD-style licence (for some fee,
something like "do what you want but I will do what I want with
my code").

>> If A sold a BSD licence to B only and this B sold a proprietary
>> licence (for a derived work) to C, C (without that clause) wouldn't
>> have a BSD licence to the original work. This is BTW common scenario.
>
> C most certainly would have a BSD license, should he choose to comply with
> terms, to every protectable element that is in both the original work and
> the work he received.

But he may have received only binary program image - or the source
under NDA.
Sure, NDA doesn't cover public information, but BSD doesn't mean public.
Now what?

> C has no right to license any protectable element he did not author to
> anyone else. He cannot set the license terms for those elements to C.

Sure, the licence covers the >>>entire work<<<, not some "elements".

> Neither the BSD nor the GPL ever give you the right to change the actual
> license a work is offered under by the original author.

Of course, that's a very distant thing.

>> BTW: a work by multiple authors is a different thing than a work
>> derived from another.
>
> In practice it doesn't matter.

Of course it does. Only author of a (derived) work can licence
it, in this case he/she could change the licence back to BSD,
or sell it to MS (if not based on GPL etc).

> Would you argue that I can license Disney's "The Lion King" movie to you if
> I promise not to sue you over any (no) rights that I possess to it?

Sure you can :-) that doesn't mean it would protect me from Disney,
but you can.

> You are confusing licenses of two very different types. The BSD and GPL
> licenses only cover modification and distribution, two rights you do not get
> to MS Windows at all. *Use* is not restricted under copyright.

I'm told in the USA use = copying from disk to RAM = distribution,
isn't it true? :-)
It doesn't matter of course.

> There is simply nothing remotely comparable to the BSD or GPL license in the
> case of MS Windows. There is no grant of additional rights beyond those you
> get automatically with lawful possession (such as use).

I don't compare them (though you can). You don't get a licence for
"original elements" in MS-Windows, do you?

> If MS wished to grant someone the right to modify or redistribute Windows,
> that person would also need to obtain the right to modify or distribute
> protectable elements not authored by Microsoft. The only way they could
> obtain those rights, assuming Microsoft didn't have written relicensing
> agreements, is from the original author under the original licenses.

Yes, but it isn't automatic. Imagine you have received something
from MS, under more permissive licence (I think such things did
happen). How do you, for example, recognice boundaries of the
elements, IOW what additional rights do you have to each line in
the code or pixel in the font?

The file itself only states:
(C) MS
portions (C) e.g. Bitstream
licenced under their special agreement

What extra rights do you receive from Bitstream? Perhaps you should
ask them if they have given you some licence? :-)

Or another example, redistributable runtime libraries. What extra
rights do you have?

What you write is true for GPL, but it doesn't mean it's true
everytime. It's just that clause in the GPL.
--
Krzysztof Halasa

2007-09-17 23:47:48

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Mon, Sep 17, 2007 at 03:06:37PM -0700, Can E. Acar wrote:
> The only remaining issue is whether Nick & Jiri have enough
> original contributions to the code to be added to the Copyright.
>
> I believe this needs to be resolved between Reyk and Nick and Jiri.
>
> The main reason of Theo's message, linked earlier, was the
> lack of response on this issue. It seems that the SFLC is
> dismissing this issue, and thus stalling its resolution by the
> developers.

OK, so all of this flaming, and digging up of "licenses ripped off",
and chaff thrown up in the air, and moaning and bewailing about
"theft", is now down to these two lines regarding Nick and Jiri:

> * Copyright (c) 2004-2007 Reyk Floeter <[email protected]>
> * Copyright (c) 2006-2007 Nick Kossifidis <[email protected]>
> * Copyright (c) 2007 Jiri Slaby <[email protected]>
> [snip rest of BSD license]

It's under a BSD license; what material difference does those two
lines make, for goodness sake? It's under a BSD license, so it's not
like anything won't be "given back". Whether or not they have made
enough for changes is really a question for the lawyers, and may
differ from one jurisdiction to another --- but whether or not they
have now, or maybe will not make until later --- does it really make a
difference? Who gets hurt if someone gets they get a bit more credit
than they deserve? Certainly the most important thing is that Reyk is
given proper credit, right?

- Ted

2007-09-17 23:57:18

by Ingo Schwarze

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

[email protected] wrote on Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 04:40:38PM -0700:
> On Sun, 16 Sep 2007, Jacob Meuser wrote:

>> so the linux community is morally equivilent to a corporation?
>> that's what it sounds like you are all legally satisfied with.
>
> if it's legal it's legal. it's not a matter of the Linux community being
> satisfied with it, it's a matter of the BSD people desiring it based on
> their selection of license (and the repeated statements that this feature
> of the BSD license being an advantage compared to the GPL makes it clear
> that this isn't an unknown side effect, it's an explicit desire).

Indeed, that argument is often paraphrased in a way that makes it
hard to understand. What i heard people say is not "If people make
derivative works based on BSD code, they should make them less free
instead of fully free", but it is: "If people caring nothing about
free software in the first place are building their own commercial
systems anyway, they should rather reuse BSD code than hacking up
their own bricolage of bug-ridden insecure stuff."

Granted, that's a different approach than taken by the GPL, which
essentially says "... anyway, they deserve to be on their own."

> so the Linux community is following the desires of the BSD community
> by following their license but the BSD community is unhappy, why?

Be careful not to confuse "desires" with "legal requirements"... :-(

Given BSD code, BSD-licensed substantial improvements
make happier than restrictively licensed substantial improvements
make happier than derived non-free closed-source software
make happier than license violations.

Besides, the Linux communities neither qualify as "caring nothing
about free software" nor as "hacking up their own bricolage of
bug-ridden insecure stuff" (hopefully ;-). So that argument
simply doesn't apply to you. Probably, that's why Jacob talked
about "morally equivalent to a corporation".

> you claim that it's unethical for the linux community to use the
> code, but brag about NetApp useing the code. what makes NetApp ok
> and Linux evil? many people honestly don't understand the logic
> behind this. please explain it.

Several people have already explained this nicely; the degree
of happiness may also depend on the level of cooperation and
understanding you expect from the people building on the code,
given their own intentions and goals. I may well be thankful
towards an enemy just for not killing me, but at the same time
sad about a friend leaving me out in the rain.

( This just being stated in general; i'm not sure what the state
of discussions in the various Linux communities is just now. )

2007-09-18 00:04:19

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: RE: Wasting our Freedom

> "David Schwartz" <[email protected]> writes:

> > My point is that you *cannot* prevent a recipient of a
> > derivative work from
> > receiving any rights under either the GPL or the BSD to any protectable
> > elements in that work.
>
> Of course you can.

No you can't.

> What rights do you have to BSD-licenced works, made available
> (under BSD) to MS exclusively? You only get the binary object...

You are equating what rights I have with my ability to exercise those
rights. They are not the same thing. For example, I once bought the rights
to publically display the movie "Monty Python and the Holy Grail". To my
surprise, the rights to public display did not include an actual copy of the
film.

In any event, I never claimed that anyone has rights to a protectable
element that they do not possess a lawful copy of. That's a complete
separate issue and one that has nothing to do with what's being discussed
here because these are all cases where you have the work.

> You know, this is quite common practice - instead of assigning
> copyright, you can grant a BSD-style licence (for some fee,
> something like "do what you want but I will do what I want with
> my code").

Sure, *you* can grant a BSD-style license to any protectable elements *you*
authored. But unless your recpients can obtain a BSD-style license to all
protectable elements in the work from their respective authors, they cannot
modify or distribute it.

*You* cannot grant any rights to protectable elements authored by someone
else, unless you have a relicensing agreement. Neither the GPL nor the BSD
is one of those.

> >> If A sold a BSD licence to B only and this B sold a proprietary
> >> licence (for a derived work) to C, C (without that clause) wouldn't
> >> have a BSD licence to the original work. This is BTW common scenario.
> >
> > C most certainly would have a BSD license, should he choose to
> > comply with
> > terms, to every protectable element that is in both the
> > original work and
> > the work he received.

> But he may have received only binary program image - or the source
> under NDA.
> Sure, NDA doesn't cover public information, but BSD doesn't mean public.
> Now what?

What the hell does that have to do with anything? Are you just trying to be
deliberately dense or waste time? Is it not totally obvious how the
principles I explain apply to a case like that?

Only someone who signs an NDA must comply with it. If you signed an NDA, you
must comply with it. An NDA can definitely subtract rights. It's a complex
question whether an NDA can subtract GPL rights, but again, that has nothing
to do with what we're talking about here.

Sure, you can have the right from me to do X and still not be allowed to do
X because you agreed with someone else not to do it. So what?

> > C has no right to license any protectable element he did not author to
> > anyone else. He cannot set the license terms for those elements to C.

> Sure, the licence covers the >>>entire work<<<, not some "elements".

This is a misleading statement. The phrase "entire work" has two senses. The
license definitely does not cover the "entire work" in the sense of every
protectable element in the work unless each individual author of those
elements chose to offer that element under that license.

If by "entire work", you mean any compilation or derivative work copyright
the "final" author has, then yes, that's available under whatever license
the "final" author places it under. But that license does not actually
permit you to distribute the work.

This is really complicated and I wish I had a clear way to explain it.
Suppose I write a work and then you modify it. Assume your modification
includes adding new protectable elements to that work. When someone
distributes that new derivative work, they are distributing protectable
elements authored by both you and me.

Absent a relicensing agreement, they must obtain some rights from you and
some rights from me to do that. You cannot license the protectable elements
that I authored that are still in the resulting derivative work.

> > Neither the BSD nor the GPL ever give you the right to change the actual
> > license a work is offered under by the original author.
>
> Of course, that's a very distant thing.

Exactly. Every protectable element in the final work is licensed by the
original author to every recipient who takes advantage of the license offer.

> >> BTW: a work by multiple authors is a different thing than a work
> >> derived from another.
> >
> > In practice it doesn't matter.
>
> Of course it does. Only author of a (derived) work can licence
> it, in this case he/she could change the licence back to BSD,
> or sell it to MS (if not based on GPL etc).

Only the author of any protectable element can license it, whether it's in a
derivated work or by itself.

You are seriously confused if you think that just because you create a
derivative work that includes my protectable elements you can then license
the elements I created under a license you choose.

Please read GPL section 6. The license *always* flows from the *original*
licensor to the ultimate licensee.

> > Would you argue that I can license Disney's "The Lion King"
> > movie to you if
> > I promise not to sue you over any (no) rights that I possess to it?

> Sure you can :-) that doesn't mean it would protect me from Disney,
> but you can.

Well, in that case you are technically correct. Anyone can license anything
to anyone.

The point you need to understand is that to distribute any work (derivative,
composite, mere aggregation, whatever) that contains protectable elements
from multiple authors, you must obtain the right to every protectable
element you intend to distribute. You can only do so from the original
author or a relicensor. In the case of BSD or GPL licenses, there are no
relicensors.

> > You are confusing licenses of two very different types. The BSD and GPL
> > licenses only cover modification and distribution, two rights
> you do not get
> > to MS Windows at all. *Use* is not restricted under copyright.

> I'm told in the USA use = copying from disk to RAM = distribution,
> isn't it true? :-)
> It doesn't matter of course.

No. Anything that is *necessary* to do X is part of X. Copying from disk to
RAM is necessary to use the work, so it is part of use.

> > There is simply nothing remotely comparable to the BSD or GPL
> > license in the
> > case of MS Windows. There is no grant of additional rights
> > beyond those you
> > get automatically with lawful possession (such as use).

> I don't compare them (though you can). You don't get a licence for
> "original elements" in MS-Windows, do you?

You don't get a license because you don't need one. You aren't going to
distribute or modify Windows, so why would you need a license?

Microsoft may choose to impose what is really a click-through or shrink-wrap
contract. But it is not really a copyright license at all. In fact, such
agreements are enforceable even for works that cannot be copyrighted.

> > If MS wished to grant someone the right to modify or
> > redistribute Windows,
> > that person would also need to obtain the right to modify or distribute
> > protectable elements not authored by Microsoft. The only way they could
> > obtain those rights, assuming Microsoft didn't have written relicensing
> > agreements, is from the original author under the original licenses.

> Yes, but it isn't automatic. Imagine you have received something
> from MS, under more permissive licence (I think such things did
> happen). How do you, for example, recognice boundaries of the
> elements, IOW what additional rights do you have to each line in
> the code or pixel in the font?

I don't know. Why does that matter?

> The file itself only states:
> (C) MS
> portions (C) e.g. Bitstream
> licenced under their special agreement
>
> What extra rights do you receive from Bitstream? Perhaps you should
> ask them if they have given you some licence? :-)

You don't know and thus even if you have additional rights to the content,
you cannot exercise them. Having a right and being able to exercise it are
not the same thing. So what?

> Or another example, redistributable runtime libraries. What extra
> rights do you have?

Presumably, you have some license that permits you to redistribute them so
long as you comply with certain terms.

> What you write is true for GPL, but it doesn't mean it's true
> everytime. It's just that clause in the GPL.

It is true in any case where there isn't a relicensing agreement. There is
simply no other way it could work.

DS

2007-09-18 00:44:36

by Al Viro

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Mon, Sep 17, 2007 at 05:03:55PM -0700, David Schwartz wrote:
>
> > "David Schwartz" <[email protected]> writes:
>
> > > My point is that you *cannot* prevent a recipient of a
> > > derivative work from
> > > receiving any rights under either the GPL or the BSD to any protectable
> > > elements in that work.
> >
> > Of course you can.
>
> No you can't.

Gentlemen, please remove your wanking selves back to the gutter you've
crawled from. This is not slashdot[1]. This is not gnu.misc.discuss.
This is not alt.sex.cartooney.sue.sue.sue. This is a technical maillist
and that dungpile doesn't belong here. If you insist on hitting vger,
ask davem to create a new maillist (linux-kooks@... would fit that kind
of traffic nicely) and for pity sake, do fuck off already. Enough is
enough.

[1] the spews from nerds, the spews that splatter...

2007-09-18 09:07:12

by Henning Brauer

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

* Theodore Tso <[email protected]> [2007-09-17 23:04]:
> Number 2, if you take a look at their latest set of changes (which
> have still not been accepted), the HAL code is under a pure BSD
> license (ath5k_hw.c). Other portions are dual licensed, but not the
> HAL

if that is true and stays that way - excellenty!

--
Henning Brauer, [email protected], [email protected]
BS Web Services, http://bsws.de
Full-Service ISP - Secure Hosting, Mail and DNS Services
Dedicated Servers, Rootservers, Application Hosting - Hamburg & Amsterdam

2007-09-18 11:16:31

by Helge Hafting

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

Jacob Meuser wrote:
> On Mon, Sep 17, 2007 at 09:47:43AM +0200, Helge Hafting wrote:
>
>
>> Your problem seems to be with the BSD licence,
>> and the power to alter that licence lies in the BSD community.
>>
>
> I hope you can understand that this mentality is _exactly_ what has
> some in the BSD community so upset.
>
First, note that I am not really a linux developer as my only
contributions to linux are testing.

But it really looks like bsd people are more unhappy with their
licence than linux people. You can ask linux developers to
keep the bsd licence - and the request is not unreasonable.
Nobody is forced to give back, so some people choose not
to. Some of these have a "GPL" agenda, some have
a commercial agenda.

I am sure some developers are willing to "give back" bsd code,
but you can't do anything about those who don't. You don't
want to have code "locked up" with GPL, these developers
don't want their code improvements "locked up" in proprietary products.

So - either you will have to accept the current situation, or
adjust the BSD licence to cope with this.

> when I see the linux community start to take credit for works they
> did not create and I see the linux community respond to warnings
>
Taking credit for the works of others is wrong of course,
no matter what licence is involved.
> that people in the community are going overboard and jeopardizing
> the linux community, which we do all benefit from, with a more or
> less "whatever" attitude, it makes me sad. it would be like losing
> a friend. I don't like losing friends, so I get vocal.
>
> I don't understand why the linux community can't seem to say, "We
> can accept BSD licensed code. There's no need to add the GPL to
> it." and maybe even, "Although we strongly prefer the GPL,
> respect for other licenses is every bit as important as respect
> for the GPL."
>
Good points. But note that the linux community is divided on this,
as on many other issues. And there is nothing to do about
those who disagree.
> I could be wrong, but I strongly believe that if the above was
> truly accepted and believed by the community, the actions that
> started and spread this whole debacle^Wdebate would not have
> happened in the first place.
>
My impression is that the actions that started the
debate was an unauthorized (possibly illegal)
change that the linux community also rejected.
With that problem solved, the debate turned to
gpl/bsd licencing issues.
> look, the GPL legally forces others to keep the same license.
> the BSD community is asking the linux community do the same.
> and when the linux community refuses, what do you expect the
> recourse to be?
>
Clearly, there is the risk of less cooperation. Or some
kind of licencing scheme that makes sure that code with bsd
origin always can go back into bsd as long as it stays open.

That would solve the problem - if such a scheme is possible.

Helge Hafting

2007-09-18 11:49:30

by Marco Peereboom

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

Now if they'd fix the copyright message to only mention Reyk all would
be good.

On Tue, Sep 18, 2007 at 11:00:13AM +0200, Henning Brauer wrote:
> * Theodore Tso <[email protected]> [2007-09-17 23:04]:
> > Number 2, if you take a look at their latest set of changes (which
> > have still not been accepted), the HAL code is under a pure BSD
> > license (ath5k_hw.c). Other portions are dual licensed, but not the
> > HAL
>
> if that is true and stays that way - excellenty!
>
> --
> Henning Brauer, [email protected], [email protected]
> BS Web Services, http://bsws.de
> Full-Service ISP - Secure Hosting, Mail and DNS Services
> Dedicated Servers, Rootservers, Application Hosting - Hamburg & Amsterdam
>

2007-09-18 12:05:13

by Xavier Bestel

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Bandwidth

Le mardi 18 septembre 2007 ? 06:29 -0500, Marco Peereboom a ?crit :
> Now if they'd fix the copyright message to only mention Reyk all would
> be good.

All this mess so easily solved ? Too good to be true.

Xav

2007-09-18 12:31:43

by Marco Peereboom

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Bandwidth

That's it; that easy.

On Tue, Sep 18, 2007 at 02:04:46PM +0200, Xavier Bestel wrote:
> Le mardi 18 septembre 2007 ` 06:29 -0500, Marco Peereboom a icrit :
> > Now if they'd fix the copyright message to only mention Reyk all would
> > be good.
>
> All this mess so easily solved ? Too good to be true.
>
> Xav
>

2007-09-18 12:57:23

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Tue, Sep 18, 2007 at 06:29:48AM -0500, Marco Peereboom wrote:
> Now if they'd fix the copyright message to only mention Reyk all would
> be good.

It *does* mention Reyk, if you would bother to look. The thing which
Theo is kvetching about, and which apparently is enough to cause the
*BSD zombies to start attacking without actually _checking_ _for_
_themselves_ is whether or not Jiri and Nick did enough to work so
they should have their names listed in the headers. In other words,
all of the megabytes and megabhytes of flamewar is over these two
lines:

> * Copyright (c) 2006-2007 Nick Kossifidis <[email protected]>
> * Copyright (c) 2007 Jiri Slaby <[email protected]>

Petty, isn't it? Let's just say it's b.s. like this which is why, 16
years ago, I decided to work with Linux instead of BSD.

- Ted

P.S. And yes, before those two lines is:

> * Copyright (c) 2004-2007 Reyk Floeter <[email protected]>

and after those two lines is the BSD permission notice.

2007-09-18 14:29:52

by frantisek holop

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

hmm, on Mon, Sep 17, 2007 at 05:08:46AM -0700, David Schwartz said that
> > As said above, the accusations, if you read them correctly, were not
> > wrong, but spot on right. Unless someone proves that dual-licensing as
> > in "you may follow terms A or terms B at your choice" implicitly implies
> > being allowed to remove A altogether should you choose B.
>
> You are confusing licenses with license notices. The GPL says you must keep
> GPL license notices intact. Otherwise, it gives you complete freedom to
> modify. This means that if you choose the GPL, you gain (from the GPL) the
> right to remove the BSD license *NOTICE*.
>
> This has no effect on anyone's substantive rights though. Removing license
> notices has no effect on actual licenses.

but how do i know i have a bsd licensed file
if the license notice has been removed from it?

i know copyright applies to a file which has no (c) line in it,
because it's implicit. but licenses are not implicit, are they?

-f
--
treat each day as your last, one day you will be right.

2007-09-18 15:47:30

by Denis Doroshenko

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On 9/18/07, Theodore Tso <[email protected]> wrote:
> On Tue, Sep 18, 2007 at 06:29:48AM -0500, Marco Peereboom wrote:
> > Now if they'd fix the copyright message to only mention Reyk all would
> > be good.
>
> It *does* mention Reyk, if you would bother to look. The thing which
> Theo is kvetching about, and which apparently is enough to cause the
> *BSD zombies to start attacking without actually _checking_ _for_
> _themselves_ is whether or not Jiri and Nick did enough to work so
> they should have their names listed in the headers.

and did they really do enough? if those names shouldn't be there, why
play childish games and insist on putting them in?

> In other words,
> all of the megabytes and megabhytes of flamewar is over these two
> lines:
>
> > * Copyright (c) 2006-2007 Nick Kossifidis <[email protected]>
> > * Copyright (c) 2007 Jiri Slaby <[email protected]>
>
> Petty, isn't it?

and what so petty is there? who can show what those two added to the
original work so that according to the law they are allowed to put
their names in there?

> Let's just say it's b.s. like this which is why, 16
> years ago, I decided to work with Linux instead of BSD.

and who really cares about why you did this or did that? this OT
sentence sounded like real childish BC. if you want to have fun while
coding and share it with others - do it, if you want also to play
contract games - do it; choose BSD or GPL and go with it. however,
whatever you do you must respect laws. if the law says you can put
your name in only if much of work is done, so it must be. there are no
other variants. and everything will come back to you no matter whether
it is good or bad. if you ignore laws using somebody's work, the same
will be done to you one day.

> - Ted

> P.S. And yes, before those two lines is:
>
> > * Copyright (c) 2004-2007 Reyk Floeter <[email protected]>
>
> and after those two lines is the BSD permission notice.

P.S. Let's just say that BC like that is why I decided to work with
BSD instead of Linux 11 years ago.

2007-09-18 15:55:51

by frantisek holop

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

hmm, on Tue, Sep 18, 2007 at 08:56:47AM -0400, Theodore Tso said that
> On Tue, Sep 18, 2007 at 06:29:48AM -0500, Marco Peereboom wrote:
> > Now if they'd fix the copyright message to only mention Reyk all would
> > be good.
>
> It *does* mention Reyk, if you would bother to look. The thing which

the keyword is `only'. only = him and noone else (at the moment)

> Theo is kvetching about, and which apparently is enough to cause the
> *BSD zombies to start attacking without actually _checking_ _for_
> _themselves_ is whether or not Jiri and Nick did enough to work so
> they should have their names listed in the headers. In other words,

are you publicly stating that you have checked, and found the amount
of work done justifying a (c) addition of not even one but 2 persons?

> all of the megabytes and megabhytes of flamewar is over these two
> lines:
>
> > * Copyright (c) 2006-2007 Nick Kossifidis <[email protected]>
> > * Copyright (c) 2007 Jiri Slaby <[email protected]>
>
> Petty, isn't it? Let's just say it's b.s. like this which is why, 16
> years ago, I decided to work with Linux instead of BSD.

so you don't mind if a couple of us go around adding say 10 lines
of code to files you authored, and then put our copyrights under
your name? good! i am glad to hear that. a bit of additional
"undeserved credit" is always welcome anyway.
would look good in my cv.

it is not just a bit of undeserved credit. the (c) owners will
be asked in the future regarding any legal aspects of the files
they hold copyrights to. i don't think those 2 gentlemen have
earned that yet.

-f
--
dum spiro spero -- as long as i breathe i hope

2007-09-18 17:22:41

by Marco Peereboom

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Tue, Sep 18, 2007 at 08:56:47AM -0400, Theodore Tso wrote:
> On Tue, Sep 18, 2007 at 06:29:48AM -0500, Marco Peereboom wrote:
> > Now if they'd fix the copyright message to only mention Reyk all would
> > be good.
>
> It *does* mention Reyk, if you would bother to look. The thing which
> Theo is kvetching about, and which apparently is enough to cause the
> *BSD zombies to start attacking without actually _checking_ _for_
> _themselves_ is whether or not Jiri and Nick did enough to work so
> they should have their names listed in the headers. In other words,
> all of the megabytes and megabhytes of flamewar is over these two
> lines:
>
> > * Copyright (c) 2006-2007 Nick Kossifidis <[email protected]>
> > * Copyright (c) 2007 Jiri Slaby <[email protected]>

Its simple; this is illegal. Those two fruitcakes didn't do jack and
can therefore not claim copyright. Would be the same as me taking the
linux kernel and adding myself to each file. I am pretty sure some
people would be up in arms about that.

>
> Petty, isn't it? Let's just say it's b.s. like this which is why, 16
> years ago, I decided to work with Linux instead of BSD.

I don't make the laws and I did not break any so you call it whatever
you like.

>
> - Ted
>
> P.S. And yes, before those two lines is:
>
> > * Copyright (c) 2004-2007 Reyk Floeter <[email protected]>

So what? you don't get a cookie for abiding the law.

>
> and after those two lines is the BSD permission notice.

Where it belongs. Again you don't get a cookie for doing what you are
supposed to do.

Just like you don't get a cookie for taking care of your kids; you're
supposed to do that.

2007-09-18 18:04:39

by Gilles Chehade

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Tue, Sep 18, 2007 at 08:56:47AM -0400, Theodore Tso wrote:
>
> [...]
>
> Petty, isn't it? Let's just say it's b.s. like this which is why, 16
> years ago, I decided to work with Linux instead of BSD.
>

Fortunately, no one seems to miss you so much in the BSD camp ;-)

Gilles

2007-09-18 18:53:44

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

Theodore Tso wrote:
> On Mon, Sep 17, 2007 at 03:06:37PM -0700, Can E. Acar wrote:
>> The only remaining issue is whether Nick & Jiri have enough
>> original contributions to the code to be added to the Copyright.
>>
>> I believe this needs to be resolved between Reyk and Nick and Jiri.
>>
>> The main reason of Theo's message, linked earlier, was the
>> lack of response on this issue. It seems that the SFLC is
>> dismissing this issue, and thus stalling its resolution by the
>> developers.
>
> OK, so all of this flaming, and digging up of "licenses ripped off",
> and chaff thrown up in the air, and moaning and bewailing about
> "theft", is now down to these two lines regarding Nick and Jiri:

Yes, quite an improvement, considering how it all started, dont you think?
Pity it took so much pushing and dragging to get people to do the right
thing.
There is just one little step to go. It is can not be that hard, can it?

>> * Copyright (c) 2004-2007 Reyk Floeter <[email protected]>
>> * Copyright (c) 2006-2007 Nick Kossifidis <[email protected]>
>> * Copyright (c) 2007 Jiri Slaby <[email protected]>
>> [snip rest of BSD license]
>
> It's under a BSD license; what material difference does those two
> lines make, for goodness sake? It's under a BSD license, so it's not
> like anything won't be "given back".

As a programmer, you sure would know what difference any "two lines"
would make on your program. When it comes to law, you seem to lose
that intuition.

> Whether or not they have made
> enough for changes is really a question for the lawyers, and may
> differ from one jurisdiction to another
> --- but whether or not they have now, or maybe will not make until later ---

Well, they can add their names *anywhere* in the whole file, *except*
these two lines. See, these lines have a whole different meaning
when it comes to laws. When they make sufficient contribution, they
sure can add their names. What is so difficult to understand here?

I have seen some academic papers, where the first author did all the work,
the second author is the professor who funded the work, and the remaining
five "authors" are just coming along for a ride. You know what the
difference is? The original author *allows* them to put their names as
authors.

Here, you are adding names, and say "why not". It is both unethical and
illegal.

> does it really make a
> difference? Who gets hurt if someone gets they get a bit more credit
> than they deserve? Certainly the most important thing is that Reyk is
> given proper credit, right?

As long as it is not a derived work, Reyk gets to decide who is in the
copyright. Even if it is a derived work, it is polite to ask.

If, at the beginning, Nick and Jiri, and others asked Reyk to be included
in the Copyright for the adaptation work they did on the HAL. I do not
believe he would have refused. I can not talk for him, but things would
be have been resolved in a much nicer and positive way.

Instead they chose to push Reyk for months to dual license his code,
then attempted to change the whole license. Even now, when there is
just a small issue left, people are still dragging and resisting.

I am really disappointed by all this. I would have expected that once
such a patch is suggested (let alone being committed to some public place)
some senior/respected/responsible Linux person would tell them what they
are doing is wrong. Right from the start. I now see this is not how
things work around here. Senior developers are either too busy or
reluctant to get their hands dirty. In OpenBSD, (which, I accept is a
much smaller community) when one developer does something wrong,
the clue stick is there to be used by one of the more experienced
developers.
Which means, issues are resolved quickly and with much less pain.

Can

--
In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice.
But, in practice, there is.

2007-09-18 19:05:01

by Lennart Sorensen

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

On Tue, Sep 18, 2007 at 11:55:29AM -0700, Can E. Acar wrote:
> Well, they can add their names *anywhere* in the whole file, *except*
> these two lines. See, these lines have a whole different meaning
> when it comes to laws. When they make sufficient contribution, they
> sure can add their names. What is so difficult to understand here?

Please define "Sufficient contribution". And in what juristiction that
definition applies.

--
Len Sorensen

2007-09-18 19:38:13

[permalink] [raw]

Subject: Re: Wasting our Freedom

Can E. Acar wrote:
> As long as it is not a derived work, Reyk gets to decide who is in the
> copyright. Even if it is a derived work, it is polite to ask.

Additional work went in, thus additional copyrights were added.

> I am really disappointed by all this. I would have expected that once
> such a patch is suggested (let alone being committed to some public place)

In a purely open development environment, even personal developer trees
are made public. That's the way we _want_ development to occur. Out in
public, with a full audit trail.

Your implied ideal scenario is tantamount to guaranteeing that mistakes
are never committed to a public repository anywhere. Mistakes will
happen. Even legal mistakes. In public.

> some senior/respected/responsible Linux person would tell them what they
> are doing is wrong. Right from the start.

What you are seeing is an example of mistakes that were caught in
review, and corrected.

That's how any scalable review process works... the developer reviews
his own work. the team reviews the developer's work. the maintainer
reviews the team's work. the next maintainer reviews. and so on, to
the top.

Jeff

2007-09-18 19:49:35