Re: Open Source Development (was Re: Developers Needed)
Re: Open Source Development (was Re: Developers Needed)
- Subject: Re: Open Source Development (was Re: Developers Needed)
- From: Albert Atkinson <email@hidden>
- Date: Sat, 1 Jun 2002 11:44:08 -0500
Hello!
Thanks for your response. This really helps me a lot.
If I issued this under the GPL would I be able to have people email
me if they want the source that way I can respond back and tell
them the terms that way they would HAVE to agree in writing to the
terms before they can look at the source.
This way, if some conflict comes up in court I could present the
email they sent that stated they agreed to the terms...Would this
work?
Thanks!
Albert
On Saturday, June 1, 2002, at 11:25 AM, Randy Zauhar wrote:
Albert, it is always possible for someone to make small
modifications to your code, or even make significant additions,
and then sell the result as a commercial product. That clearly
violates the intent of the open source license. You can then bring
a suit against the violators, which means you need to hire a
lawyer. If the "bad guy" has lots of resources, they may blatantly
ignore your license, taking the risk that you won't have the
capability to take them on in court.
Another approach is to put patent protection on elements of your
code that represent unique algorithms or user interface features.
That of course also requires money, and I am not sure that is ever
done in the context of open source. I don't see why it couldn't be
done that way. Of course, you still have the prospect that a nasty
big corporation could ignore your patent protection (that has
certainly happened before), but it's my impression that even if
the patent is in the application process, Goliath will at least
take pause...
Good luck,
Randy
Randy J. Zauhar, PhD
Assoc. Prof. of Biochemistry
Director, Graduate Program in Bioinformatics
University of the Sciences in Philadelphia
Dept. of Chemistry & Biochemistry
600 S. 43rd Street
Philadelphia, PA 19104
Phone: (215)596-8691
FAX: (215)596-8543
E-mail: email@hidden
Web: http://tonga.usip.edu/zauhar
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