Re: Corel Linux

[Stephen J. Turnbull <nospam [at] sk.tsukuba.ac.jp>]

>>>>> Al == Al Hudson <eah106 [at] york.ac.uk> writes:

Al> They might want to give stuff back so they don't violate the
Al> GPL. ... oh, hang on, they have violated the GPL. I suppose
Al> giving stuff back was nice after all.... ;)))

Al> On Tue, 21 Sep 1999, Stephen J. Turnbull wrote:

>> Eh? Have you informed the FSF of this fact?

Al> I think they know already! I'm referring to the beta release
Al> programme

For heaven's sake, this is less than 24 hours old and it's about 1 am
in California.

Are we grownups here? Or would we rather sound like a bunch of
16-year-old punks trying out for gang membership?

Yes, Corel's error requires response. The GPL doesn't allow you to
distribute beta versions under restricted terms to anybody (who hasn't
already signed away their rights to you, eg, in an employment
contract). But if we want OSS to go mainstream, we should talk in
language you might find in the Economist rather than in the headlines
of the Sun. These guys are a big company, they've been doing business
in the usual way for many years, and there is no such thing as an
experienced OSS legal department, except maybe at Red Hat, now.

Let them have their morning coffee first, and see if they can think
clearly after that, whaddyasay?

--
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Institute of Policy and Planning Sciences Tel/fax: +81 (298) 53-5091
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