You can't have complete control of your work unless it is completely your own property.

For a work to be completely your own property, you must have uniquely created 100% of that work. This is usually not the case.

Authors usually merely modify or build upon, exsiting works. This is OK, but it waives the author's "rights" to lord over something they didn't really create. I challenge anyone to demonstrate a completely original work. (and lets not make this about religion)

Generally speaking, works draw from existing science, language, and culture. In the realm of computer programs, they are based upon programming languages, styles, and conventions.

When you draw on someone else' work in authoring your own, you owe your work to the author of what you drew from. You will soon realize that all of our works are mostly owed to the collective works of everyone, thus you have no right to restrict everyone's rights to those works.

This is why Intellectual Property doesn't work.

Billy Crook wrote:

You can't have complete control of your work unless it is completely your own property.

For a work to be completely your own property, you must have uniquely created 100% of that work. This is usually not the case.

Not quite. A work can still be completely your own property, if and only if the "work" is the *unique* way in which you combine or modify other component works. Even the original author of the work cannot use your *unique* reworking of their original without violating your rights.

This creates a sort of gridlock, because if the original author and the owner of the derivative work cannot come to a compromise of their rights, then *neither* can propagate the derivative work.

For a visual illustration, see the attached GIF.

If the creator of a work makes no exceptions to the default rights granted by copyright law, then no one can redistribute a derivative work (fair use aside).

If the creator of a work puts the work in the public domain, then anyone can redistribute the work or a derivative work, regardless of the terms of redistribution or the later wishes of the original creator.

I think the original point of this thread was to discuss the fact that there are no simple "in between" options for either the original creator or the creator of a derivative work. The only means available at present is to reserve all of the rights permissible by copyright, and then license out the permissions you desire by way of complex IP contracts (read: GPL).

While I find the idea of an "in between" option, without contracts/licenses, to be intriguing, I don't think it would work in practice. We already have enough clashes between different copyright and public domain laws in different countries. To add another classification to the mix, and expect it to be in anyway universal, would be asking for trouble. On top of that, as we can see with the diversity of licenses available, it would be hard to come to a consensus.

With the large number of established licenses available, it is not too difficult to release your work to the public while prohibiting commercial redistribution. For example, the CreativeCommons provides a license for such uses.

Lastly, one fault of the argument presented in the original message is the ambiguity of the term "profit". The whole concept of open source involves many people contributing, and therefore everyone profiting. A profit is simply a gain of value, it doesn't necessarily have to be monetary.

~Bradley

A license isn't a contract. There is no place for you to sign the GPL to agree to it. It's just that if you don't accept the GPL, you don't have legal permission to do what it licenses you to do.

On 9/27/07, Jon Pruente jdpruente@gmail.com wrote:

Another problem is that for a license to be binding in court it must function as a contract.

On 9/27/07, Bradley Hook bhook@kssb.net wrote:

Restated: The *license* is not a contract, but agreeing to the license creates an implied contract.

That's better. The reason why I bring this up is that the FSF says that a license is not a contract, and MS seems to say that it is. I assume their reason for doing so is to try to muddy the waters when it comes to "Intellectual Property".

In any jurisdiction where IP issues will ever be handled in a manner

reasonable for these purposes, IP rights are of real value.

There are at least four different kinds of "Intellectual Property": 1) Copyright 2) Patent 3) Trademark 4) Trade Secret Each of these has its own law. Throwing them together and calling them by the same name tends to conflate them, rather than improving understanding.

On 9/27/07, David Nicol davidnicol@gmail.com wrote:

http://www.thedjbway.org/license_free.html

What a wanker:

Like his source code, Bernstein has highly optimized the whole "LICENSE" algorithm --to the point there is no LICENSE at all. Just this simple, single, clean statement of copyright.

Then he points to http://cr.yp.to/qmail/dist.html and http://cr.yp.to/distributors.html, which set out terms under which he allows people to distribute his copyrighted work. Those terms constitute... a LICENSE.

On 9/27/07, David Nicol davidnicol@gmail.com wrote:

Sorry; I didn't actually inspect the link I sent previously to verify that it had no clicks at all to

http://cr.yp.to/softwarelaw.html

which says, once you legally obtain software, you may modify it, if you have the time and inclination.

It cites 17 USC 117http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode17/usc_sec_17_00000117----000-.html :

(a) * Making of Additional Copy or Adaptation by Owner of Copy.— *Notwithstanding the provisions of section 106http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode17/usc_sec_17_00000106----000-.html, it is not an infringement for the owner of a copy of a computer program to make or authorize the making of another copy or adaptation of that computer program provided: (1) that such a new copy or adaptation is created as an essential step in the utilization of the computer program in conjunction with a machine and that it is used in no other manner, or (2) that such new copy or adaptation is for archival purposes only and that all archival copies are destroyed in the event that continued possession of the computer program should cease to be rightful.

I assume he's referring to (1) above. But the adaptation is ONLY allowed if it's "essential".

So if my daughter buys a commercial program that's written for Windows XP, and wants to use it on her Vista machine, but it won't work correctly, and some hacker has created a patch that will fix the problem, she's allowed to use that patch to modify the program. Adapting the program to run under Linux would probably be covered as well.

If a blind person needs to have a program modified so that it will work correctly with text-to-speech readers, the copyright holder can't prohibit that adaptation, as it's "essential" to that person.

If we stray too far from those two kinds of adaptations (platform and disability), we lose our protection under 17 USC 117(a)(1).

There is nothing that allows adaptation to add new functionality that isn't "essential" (whatever that is). And even under that provision, there is still no right to redistribute the adapted work.

So I still say the guy's a wanker if he thinks we don't need a license to legally distribute his copyrighted work.

On 9/28/07, David Nicol davidnicol@gmail.com wrote:

On 9/28/07, Monty J. Harder mjharder@gmail.com wrote:

...

There is nothing that allows adaptation to add new functionality that

isn't

...

"essential" (whatever that is). And even under that provision, there is still no right to redistribute the adapted work.

nobody is saying there is a right to redistribute an adapted work.

...

So I still say the guy's a wanker if he thinks we don't need a license

to

...

legally distribute his copyrighted work.

Nobody's saying that either.

My father taught me when I was a wee lad to be careful about using absolutes like "always", "never", "everybody", or "nobody". Let me repeat the quote from your first link:

Like his source code, Bernstein has highly optimized the whole "LICENSE" algorithm --to the point there is no LICENSE at all. Just this simple, single, clean statement of copyright.

That's SOMEBODY making that exact claim: "no LICENSE", followed by links to... LICENSES. You can't walk that one back.

What is being said, which is easy to misconstrue

I'm hardly misconstruing your words:

once you legally obtain software, you may modify it,if you have the time and inclination.

which is not supported by the law referenced in YOUR links.

as that, is that after you have done made some kind of essential

repair, arguments against sharing the story of how you did it, complete with circles and arrows, four part harmony, and diff files, on copyright infringement grounds, are specious.

Well, put this way, we have solid legal grounds upon which to stand. Releasing a patch program that can convert the original program into the essentially repaired version should be 100% free of problems with anything other than patents which theoretically encumber every program ever written, with the possible exception of a program that does absolutely nothing, including defining a particular exit code such as the POSIX standards true and false provided that it is accompanied by the standard disclaimer of warranty and the original author's responsibility for the modified program.

But that's a far cry from the simplistic language quoted above. The fact that the FSF has now revised the GPL twice is an indication that this stuff isn't easy. Personally, I think they've pushed some things in GPLv3 that a lot of people won't agree to, and we'll see a GPLv4 quite a bit sooner than RMS expected to address those concerns.

For example, I don't see where 'Tivoization' has anything to do with a software license, and the ham-handed attempts to stop it could keep some manufacturers from using GPLv3 code on their hardware. Provided that the customer is aware before the sale that the hardware requires software signed by the hardware manufacturer, I say "caveat emptor", and the customer has the freedom to accept this deal if he wants. Personally, I'd prefer customers to be able to run whatever software they want, but it could void any obligation the manufacturer would have to support the modified system, as well as the warranty, as goofy software can damage certain hardware.

But as a software license, the GPL shouldn't be addressing the issue. The software is completely free to be adapted and run on other hardware. And since it is more restrictive than GPLv2, no one can take software licensed under GPLv2 and produce a GPLv3 fork, without some other action on the part of the copyright holder(s) to authorize doing so.

On 10/1/07, Brian Kelsay ripcrd@gmail.com wrote:

I have a hard time with understanding how the government via the courts can allow patent suits, copyright claims, et al ad nauseum when the person/company that sells the item disclaims all warranty for the product and even states that "it may not even be fit for the use it is intended." Run with that Monty or someone.

Well, copyright is easy. A book can by copyrighted regardless of any fitness for use. This email is Copyright (c) MMVII Monty J. Harder (portions Copyright Brian Kelsay). All rights reversed.

A computer program is no different WRT copyright. I once wrote a package of little DOS utilities for shoehorning programs into the upper memory block corresponding to monochrome video, and explicitly disclaimed everything. The only thing I guaranteed the package to do was take up space on hard drives.

Now, patents are an entirely different kettle of fish as it were. One of the reasons I hate the term "Intellectual Property" is that it conflates these things. In order to get a patent, the thing you're trying to patent has to actually work. Arguably, this makes the burden of proof a bit higher on patent holders than on copyright holders.

David Nicol wrote:

http://cr.yp.to/softwarelaw.html

which says, once you legally obtain software, you may modify it, if you have the time and inclination.

The problem is that Microsoft doesn't sell copies of software, they sell licenses. If you carefully read Microsoft's recent EULA, as with many others, you should note that the license does not grant you ownership of the software. Microsoft has made much more of a shift in this direction recently. For example, my employer purchased a large number of licenses from Microsoft recently, and we waited for something (anything!) to come in the mail. After about a month, we started making calls because we hadn't received anything. We were informed that our purchase wouldn't result in us receiving anything... our invoice served as proof of purchase for the licenses. In my mind, this basically meant we spent thousands of dollars on an *invoice*!

Under Microsoft's logic, the shrink-wrapped CD you have still belongs to Microsoft. Since you do not own it, most of the rights granted under fair use are not available to you. I do not agree with this!

However, this does present us with a couple of loopholes.

First: The whole "invoice=license" concept means that in order to use the license, you have to purchase a "media kit". The media kit is *not* licensed, and therefore by purchasing it you legitimately own a copy of the software - fair use applies.

Second: Certain fair use rights don't require you to own the copy in the first place. For example, academic fair use permits copying for academic purposes, and this right is often exercised in libraries where the person does not own the copy.

~Bradley

--- Oren Beck orenbeck@gmail.com wrote:

MY concept is to empower a creator of IP to place their work in an eternal public domain.

That's simple to do, all you have to do is distribute your IP as Public Domain. Once you, the author release this with your copyright and a declaration it is released to public domain no one can ever take it back. Not even you. What happens to derivatives of that is a different story, but yours is always public domain. I have done this with some things I've written.