From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.3 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00,INVALID_MSGID autolearn=no autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 103376,faf964ea4531e6af X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-Thread: 1025b4,43ae7f61992b3213 X-Google-Attributes: gid1025b4,public From: Robert Dewar Subject: Re: GPL and "free" software Date: 1999/04/27 Message-ID: <7g3at7$otr$1@nnrp1.dejanews.com>#1/1 X-Deja-AN: 471300343 References: <3723c38b@eeyore.callnetuk.com> <925098459snz@vision25.demon.co.uk> X-Http-Proxy: 1.0 x13.dejanews.com:80 (Squid/1.1.22) for client 205.232.38.14 Organization: Deja News - The Leader in Internet Discussion X-Article-Creation-Date: Tue Apr 27 03:28:43 1999 GMT Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada,gnu.misc.discuss X-Http-User-Agent: Mozilla/4.04 [en] (OS/2; I) Date: 1999-04-27T00:00:00+00:00 List-Id: In article <925098459snz@vision25.demon.co.uk>, philh@vision25.demon.co.uk wrote: > They can demand that B give them the source. Well they can demand it, but if B says no, it is A who has to do something about it. The GPL does not compel people to give sources, it just fails to license you to redistribute sources without the sources, so if B refuses to give C sources, they are violating A's copyright. C has no standing in the matter. It's all fairly straightforward, and of course in practice these kind of marginal situations rarely arise, so in practice the details can be left moot without really affecting anyone significantly. One very curious case would be the case in which the copyright holder, A, gives B a program, ostensibly under the GPL, but then refuses to give B the sources. The result would be that B could not redistribute the program since they do not have a valid license to do so, since they cannot meet the source requirement for the redistribution. There is no copyright issue here, but presumably B can sue A for breach of contract (for not meeting the requirements of the agreed on license vehicle). I must say I have never heard of anything like the occurrences discussed here happening. The only GPL-shady thing I have heard even rumours of at all is the business of distributing GPL'ed software for proprietary chips together with a non-disclosure forbidding disclosure of anything regarding the chip, including any GPL'ed software that runs on it. -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==---------- http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own