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sm-discuss - Re: [SM-Discuss] Social Contract Revision - Part II

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  • From: Seth Alan Woolley <seth AT positivism.org>
  • To: Eric Sandall <eric AT sandall.us>
  • Cc: sm-discuss <sm-discuss AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [SM-Discuss] Social Contract Revision - Part II
  • Date: Thu, 10 Feb 2005 11:47:32 -0800

On Thu, Feb 10, 2005 at 10:41:42AM -0800, Eric Sandall wrote:
> Quoting Andrew <afrayedknot AT thefrayedknot.armory.com>:
> > On Thu, Feb 10, 2005 at 09:40:47AM -0800, Eric Sandall wrote:
> > > There are two parts to this revision of our Social Contract[0] (SC) that
> > I'd
> > > like to propose.
> > >
> > > The second part, this one, talks about adding clauses to our SC for
> > ownership of
> > > contributions to SMGL.
> > >
> > > I would like to propose an addendum to Article I or a new Article
> > > between
> > > Articles I and II:
> > >
> > > All developers of Source Mage GNU/Linux agree to assign over copyright
> > > and
> > > ownership of their contributions for Source Mage GNU/Linux to the public
> > group
> > > Source Mage GNU/Linux under the GNU GPL.
> > >
> > > Would that cover the bases we're talking about?
> > >
> >
> > I think it should be clear that they need to document what work they do
> > through a ChangeLog, and it sould also specify that Source Mage is not
> > claiming authorship of their work changes.
> >
> > -Andrew
>
> So:
> All developers of Source Mage GNU/Linux agree to assign over copyright and
> ownership, but not authorship, of their contributions, which shall be
> documented in a ChangeLog, for Source Mage GNU/Linux to the public group
> Source
> Mage GNU/Linux under the GPL.
>
> Better? Maybe needs to be more spread out and not have all the clauses in
> one
> sentence?

I don't think this is necessary at the moment, for two reasons.

The second clause is implied by section 1 when it refers to the GPL, if
they send it to us under the GPL. However, somebody can submit code
under a less restrictive license than the GPL, which is all fine and
good, in certain cases, when it is distinct, unentangled code
(law-speak: comprising mere aggregation instead of derivation). Then
again, this loophole is the exact case of the installer code at issue.
If it's noted in the changelog that the copyright notice was moved to
the ChangeLog from the beginning of the file, then we're in full
GPL-compliance as far as I see it and no amendments are needed. If they
force us (and of course anybody else in order to prevent us from getting
their code through a GPL-accepting proxy) to KEEP their copyright notice
in a certain location, this is an additional requirement to the GPL, and
is thus not even allowed to be re-released under the same GPL we have
released the rest of the code under. If we change our GPL to be "with
copyright notices kept at the top of the files where they exist", we
have to go back and get permission to change the GPL we used to be more
restrictive, and then our code cannot then be considered FSF
GPL-compatible. They can ask us to do it, but not require.

Also, Requiring copyright assignment on incoming code is a philosophical
additional requirement to the GPL. That means our group is not
GPL-compatible in spirit although by law it would be. Any code we
release is GPL, and there are no legal problems with enforcing copyright
assignment, but then anybody can fork us and not have the requirement.
Who is going to go through the effort when they don't with Gentoo? The
Free Software Foundation requires copyright assignement for many of its
own projects, so we could do this, but I just don't think it's
necessary, and I don't think it's the most free way, despite the fact
that the FSF does it.

Seth

--
Seth Alan Woolley [seth at positivism.org], SPAM/UCE is unauthorized
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