Vanilla Netrek Server Development Archive
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[VANILLA-L:1466] Re: [VANILLA-L:1457] Re: Discussion



On Tue, Feb 16, 1999 at 03:01:03PM +1100, James Cameron wrote:
> Dave Ahn wrote:
> > To be sure, we would need permission from all listed contributors
> > to place their contributions under GPL.
> 
> What constitutes a reasonable effort to contact them under your law?

The strictest interpretations of the law requires a lot of details.  But
for Netrek software, I think it'll be suffient to get emailed permissions
(preferrably PGP signed) from the listed contributors.

On Mon, Feb 15, 1999 at 10:10:46PM -0600, Steve Sheldon wrote:
> 
>  I like the current license which simply states you are free to do whatever
> you want with this as long as you don't charge to use, distribute, modify,
> copy, whatever.

One major difference is that GPL prevents a third party (say Microsoft) from
taking the software, optionally modifying it, never submitting those changes
back to the public, and selling it for a profit.  The current Netrek license
allows all this.

>  Besides, you'd have to get permission from all sorts of other people,
> including the original authors.  Chris Guthrie, Kevin Smith, Scott Silvey,
> etc.

It's probably enough to just get permissions from authors that are named in
the sources and docs.

>  I'm all for taking advantage of the moronic Linux horde, but I don't like
> the GNU license and think it would be evil to succumb to their stupidity.

GPL isn't the best license for all OSS packages.  But many of its terms, I
feel, apply to a well designed and fine tuned (but struggling) game like
Netrek.  I certainly don't think GPL is stupid.  Any author who can't live
with the licensing terms shouldn't put his/her work under it.

On Mon, Feb 15, 1999 at 10:34:44PM -0600, Steve Sheldon wrote:
> 
>  I don't see why you would think the Berkeley license is more restrictive.

I'm sorry, I meant 'less' restrictive.  The BSD license does not require
changes to be made public.  This is one of the main reasons cited for the
relatively small effort in the BSD arena (despite code maturity) compared
to the explosion of Linux/GNU software.  As for Netrek, I feel that we should
have this "free derivatives" clause.

>  We've already made a deal with the RSA guys.

If we do decide to go for GPL (or whatever), we should get a copy of the
original permission or secure a new one.  Or not use RSA at all.  :)

>  - The GPL does not appear to allow for the author to control distribution
> and use of their program.  i.e. non-commercial only.

This is true with GPL as well as BSD.  Because of this reason, some OSS
software like Apache and SSH have their own licenses.  But the majority of
Netrek code does not have a "non-commercial" clause anyway.

>  - By going with the GPL the author appears to give away all rights
> associated as author of the program.  That is, if I write something and
> release it under the GPL.  Then later on find that I want to write a
> program under a commercial license, I am not permitted to use any of the
> code I wrote, not even code fragments, from that which I released under the
> GPL.

This is also true.  The GPL takes away the author's control but guarantees
that the software stays in the OSS realm.  If you write GPL'ed software,
you know that all derivatives of that software will also be publicly
available in source form.  It's a tradeoff.

There are ways to get around your example, but it gets rather complicated.
Unless a lot of people are really interested, I won't elaborate.

> I don't think it needs to be GPL'd to be part of a Linux distribution, as 
> I already pointed out with Apache there are numerous pieces which are not.  

You're right.  But Netrek needs to be under GPL if we want to take advantage
of GNU/FSF's free publicity.  And right now, GNU/FSF spans most of the OSS
realm and hype.  Getting listed in the GNU software package list, having
references from their WWW sites, etc would be beneficial enough to warrant
the use of GPL, IMO.


-- 
Dave Ahn <ahn@vec.wfubmc.edu>        |  "When you were born, you cried and the
                                     |  world rejoiced.  Try to live your life
Virtual Endoscopy Center             |  so that when you die, you will rejoice
Wake Forest Univ. School of Medicine |  and the world will cry."  -1/2 jj^2
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