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Re: [OT] Free licenses, possibly viral?

Ruffin Bailey wrote:
| I'm reading that I can ship with LGPL jars (or the GPL with the
| exception above), but would prefer to get out from under all this
| hubbub.

You can. Use libraries that don't have the GNU License attached. Then there's no question at all about whether your software is affected. The FSF isn't the only source of free software. If you want to be 100% sure that your software isn't "infected" by the GPL, then don't use anything with a GPL license. It appears to me that you're saying, "I want to use GPL-licensed software, but I don't want to have to abide by the license terms."

That's still the basic point: the creator of the software is free to attach any license he or she likes to that software, imposing any terms on use that may be felt proper. If you don't want to agree to those terms, don't use the software. The license attached to a piece of software is one of the things to consider when selecting it initially. If you've waited until you're ready to distribute to read the license, you've waited far too long. Where I work, they like free software, and regularly incorporate free libraries into the product (for example, Doug Lea's concurrency library). On occasion, I've needed to track down a library to do some specific task, and the *first* thing I look at is the license. If the library was covered by the GNU license, I dropped it from consideration immediately, because, under the circumstances, the terms weren't acceptable.


| The argument that you can still sell Free software commercially drives
| me perhaps the most crazy.

Why? You can sell anything that people will buy. People have successfully sold cans of air. They've sold "pet rocks". I've seen a web site that sells "origami boulders", which are nothing more than balls of wadded-up paper. There are "services" that will, for a fee, get you a government-supplied service that you could do yourself for free. (Legal ones, even!) Given all that, selling free software barely rates a blink.

However, that you *can* sell free software isn't the point. The people who make their software free aren't in it for the money. They've made it free because they believe it *should* be free. The FSF is merely more agressive about it.


| Attaching my software to GPL code wouldn't mean I couldn't sell it, but
| it would mean that John Schmoe, who didn't contribute second number one
| to my software, has the right to request my source, create a build, and
| sell the exact same thing for whatever price he would prefer.

Assuming your use of GPL software causes *your* software to be affected, yes, that's entirely true. If it doesn't, then you retain the right to license your software however you wish. (Well, to be strictly correct, he *doesn't* have to request the source. You are obligated to make it available to him.)

OS X includes GPL-licensed software, and Apple, honoring the license, distributes the source code to that software. However, you've no doubt noticed that source code to the Aqua UI is somewhat harder to acquire, even though it coexists--and *uses* that same GPL'd software.

The GPL sets out its terms quite specifically. If your use of that software doesn't fall into one of the categories which obligates you to adopt the GPL as well, you have no obligation to adopt the GPL. If you don't understand what it says, you should be asking the FSF, not us.

Overall, you seem to miss the point. Whether John Schmoe *has* contributed is irrelevant. The purpose of the GPL is to allow John Schmoe to contribute *in the future*. Free software isn't about "payback", it's about "pay forward": your work benefits John Schmoe, whose added work will benefit Jane Doe, and so on.


| Hey, I'd love to grab the source to MS Word and start making builds,
| but I don't feel I've earned that right

Correction: you haven't *purchased* or *acquired* or *been given* that right. Rights cannot be earned.


| Gaining the right to sell my software simply because you understand how
| ant works doesn't make common sense to me, which is where I fork from
| the FSF.

Your statement doesn't make sense to me. How does "understanding how ant works" have any bearing on whether you have the right to sell your own software? *Using* it might, depending on the license, but merely *understanding* it can't possibly do so.


You seem to have some serious misbeliefs about rights and how they affect software. You cannot *gain* the right to sell your own software. You start out with that right. It's your creation, you have the right to sell it, give it away, put it on T-shirts, print it in newspaper ads, whatever. Other software authors start out with the same right.

As part of that right, you are entitled to attach any price you choose to that software, which someone else must pay to gain the right to *use* your software. If the potential customer chooses not to pay the price, whatever form it takes, he or she doesn't acquire right of use.

Now, anyone adopting the GPL (which is a much wider community than the Free Software Foundation) has chosen to make the price of using their software the forced adoption of the GPL's terms, to the extent the use is covered by the GPL. You don't *gain* the right to sell your software by avoiding GPL'd libraries, you *relinquish* that right by *using* GPL'd software. You trade the right to distribute your software on your terms for the right to use the GPL'd software, gaining one right at the cost of another. By the terms of the GPL, you can't have both. (Again, this assumes that the use is one covered by the GPL. If it's not, then the GPL has no effect on your software.)

The problem here is simple: you want to use GPL'd software, but you don't want to pay the price. This is no different from, "I want to use Photoshop, but I think it's too expensive." The answer is, if you're not willing to pay the price, don't use the software.


| This is why I like the LGPL -- or at least what it used to mean before
| all this linking jive came up.

The meaning of the LGPL hasn't changed. Only your understanding of it. As always, one should be sure to understand the contract one signs *before* signing it.


| I do not feel, however, that if I use your library in my app, that I
| should be forced to open source the whole lot of what I've been doing.

Then, if that's what the library obligates you to do, don't use the library. No one has forced you to choose a GPL'd library. You did that of your own free will.


| And that's why I'm a little upset that no new license that's easy for
| the layman to read and interpret has come about to help protect works
| written in Java that are meant to help people who create commercial
| apps to which they would like to have the sole right to release.

First, what difference does it make what language software is written in?

Second, you appear to believe that the GPL is the only "free software" license currently in existence. In fact, there are many of them, and some of them impose virtually *no* requirements on the user. Take a look at http://www.opensource.org/licenses/, and you'll see several dozen. And if none of those is what you want, write your own.


| Though, that said, copyright lengths are much too long.

Nothing prevents you from putting your work into the public domain before the copyright term expires.


| These aren't books, fellows.

Actually, sometimes they are. There was, many years ago, an annotated version of the Unix kernel source code, published in book form, while it was still owned by Bell Labs. The bookstore shelves are also stocked with "code library" books, often complete with CDs containing the same code in a more convenient form.


| Wake up and catch up, legislatures.

You might try telling this to the legistators, instead of to us. I would be quite surprised if *any* legislators are on the list.

Glen Fisher
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 >Re: [OT] Free licenses, possibly viral? (From: Ruffin Bailey <email@hidden>)



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