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Re: OT: Licensing (Re: (hbedv) antivir and procmailrc)

2004-11-23 06:48:08
Bart Schaefer wrote:
[...] What the GPL and similar open-source licenses grant you is the
 right to *publish* your modifications, so that someone *else* can
use them.

GPL and others (actually, clamassassin is based on the Berkeley license
-- my mistake) explicitly GRANT those rights, but an equal number of
shrink wrap and other licensing places all sorts of onerous restrictions
on use -- whether or not they're actually enforceable. Again, IANAL
but... if the license for a piece of software explicitly states that I
*can't* do something, whether or not I think it would stand up in court,
I don't want to bother with it. If the terms say I can't use the
code on Dell computers, then I assume that was the author's intent, and
respect his/her wishes.

The Debian community seems to hold similar beliefs. Anything NOT under
GPL or similar doesn't make it into the main distribution. The
individual is, of course, free to do what they wish, and the non-free
repositories offer stuff with "other" terms.

So when something *is* available without restrictive licensing, I think
it's worth pointing out for those that may find themselves in a
situation where the works may be used in future endeavors.

- Bob



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