Re: Final text of GPL v3 (original) (raw)

Gervase Markham gerv@mozilla.org writes:

Here's a thought experiment:

Suppose I wrote some software, and wrote it to a CD, erasing all other copies. I then wrote out, in longhand, the text of the GPLv3 on paper, and attached it to the CD, and gave it to you. This software would clearly be under the GPLv3, and you could redistribute it under those terms.

No. This is no more true than to say that, because the GPL, BSD, and Artistic licenses accompany software in Debian, that those licenses apply to all of that software.

The only thing you've clearly done is distribute a license text and a CD. The license text doesn't apply as the terms for the software on the CD unless and until the copyright holder explicitly declares so in a grant of license unabiguously on that particular software.

At the end of the day, the intentions of the licensor are important, and if those intentions are made explicitly clear, it's a bit difficult for the GPL to contradict them.

But the GPL is the intent of the licensor. You know this, because they start with "I license this code under the terms of the GPL(v3)..."

In that case, yes, I agree that the copyright holder has explicitly chosen to renounce any additional restrictions beyond those in the GPLv3 terms.

-- \ "Any sufficiently advanced bug is indistinguishable from a | `\ feature." -- Rich Kulawiec | o_) | Ben Finney

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