SCO reveals some "infringed" code...that was released under the BSD license!! MORONS!!

[n0cmonkey]

Originally posted by: BingBongWongFooey
AFAIK, any and everything in a GPLed app has to stay GPLed unless the author explicitly releases it under another license.

The BSD license is able to be overriden, because it does not explicitly disallow it. As long as the copyright and other few things are maintained as the license specifies, you can add whatever other restrictions you want, as long as they don't conflict. Just like a company can place the restriction of "neener neener, you can't see the code now."

Seems like you're suggesting that the BSD license is viral like the GPL, which seems odd, coming from you.

I am not suggesting it is viral! Not at all. I am suggesting that no one has any rights to a copyrighted piece of work, except for the copyright holder, unless explicitly granted by the copyright holder.

Because copyrights arise from the creation of a work, rather than through a registration process, there needs to be a practical way to extend permission to use a work beyond what might be allowed by "fair use" provisions of the copyright laws.

This permission typically takes the form of a "release" or "license" included in the work, which grants the additional uses beyond those granted by copyright law, usually subject to a variety of conditions.

Copyright is like a firewall, you start off with no rights, until someone gives you rights. The BSD license grants some rights, but it does have some restrictions.

* Copyright (c) 1982, 1986, 1990, 1991, 1993
* The Regents of the University of California. All rights reserved.
*
* Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
* modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions
* are met:
* 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright
* notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
* 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright
* notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the
* documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.
* 3. All advertising materials mentioning features or use of this software
* must display the following acknowledgement:
* This product includes software developed by the University of
* California, Berkeley and its contributors.
* 4. Neither the name of the University nor the names of its contributors
* may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software
* without specific prior written permission.
*
* THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE REGENTS AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND
* ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE
* IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE
* ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE REGENTS OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE
* FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL
* DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS
* OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION)
* HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT
* LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY
* OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF
* SUCH DAMAGE.
*

No where in the does the right to change the license get mentioned. Since change of license (aka. imposing more restrictions not imposed by the copyright holder, in this case) is not a right given to anyone but the copyright holder, I do not have the right to change the license of a BSD licensed work. Therefor, I cannot place more restrictions on the use of that work or any piece of it, than the copyright holder intends.

Again, you start with no rights. The copyright holder gives you rights as he sees fit. Those are the only rights you have to that work.

 

[Barnaby W. Füi]

Originally posted by: n0cmonkey

Originally posted by: BingBongWongFooey
AFAIK, any and everything in a GPLed app has to stay GPLed unless the author explicitly releases it under another license.

The BSD license is able to be overriden, because it does not explicitly disallow it. As long as the copyright and other few things are maintained as the license specifies, you can add whatever other restrictions you want, as long as they don't conflict. Just like a company can place the restriction of "neener neener, you can't see the code now."

Seems like you're suggesting that the BSD license is viral like the GPL, which seems odd, coming from you.

I am not suggesting it is viral! Not at all. I am suggesting that no one has any rights to a copyrighted piece of work, except for the copyright holder, unless explicitly granted by the copyright holder.

Because copyrights arise from the creation of a work, rather than through a registration process, there needs to be a practical way to extend permission to use a work beyond what might be allowed by "fair use" provisions of the copyright laws.

This permission typically takes the form of a "release" or "license" included in the work, which grants the additional uses beyond those granted by copyright law, usually subject to a variety of conditions.

Copyright is like a firewall, you start off with no rights, until someone gives you rights. The BSD license grants some rights, but it does have some restrictions.

* Copyright (c) 1982, 1986, 1990, 1991, 1993
* The Regents of the University of California. All rights reserved.
*
* Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
* modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions
* are met:
* 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright
* notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
* 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright
* notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the
* documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.
* 3. All advertising materials mentioning features or use of this software
* must display the following acknowledgement:
* This product includes software developed by the University of
* California, Berkeley and its contributors.
* 4. Neither the name of the University nor the names of its contributors
* may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software
* without specific prior written permission.
*
* THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE REGENTS AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND
* ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE
* IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE
* ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE REGENTS OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE
* FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL
* DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS
* OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION)
* HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT
* LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY
* OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF
* SUCH DAMAGE.
*

No where in the does the right to change the license get mentioned. Since change of license (aka. imposing more restrictions not imposed by the copyright holder, in this case) is not a right given to anyone but the copyright holder, I do not have the right to change the license of a BSD licensed work. Therefor, I cannot place more restrictions on the use of that work or any piece of it, than the copyright holder intends.

Again, you start with no rights. The copyright holder gives you rights as he sees fit. Those are the only rights you have to that work.

Kinda weird, it seems that they might not be compatible. However, not for the reasons you're arguing - Are GPL and BSD License really compatible?

That page seems pretty logical to me. But the BSD-lite license seems to have the exact same problem (or am I just an idiot?)

"Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright notice and the following disclaimer."

The GPL doesn't require the disclaimer, so saying that it *requires* the disclaimer makes it incompatible with the GPL as far as I can tell. Hmm. I might have to start investigating this more, looks like the BSD license isn't all it's cracked up to be (or all I thought it was cracked up to be, anyways).

edit: on a side not, I've looked through the OSI site and as far as I can tell, all licenses have the flaw of forcing you to reproduce the list of conditions. The MIT license looks closest to what I would consider ideal, with the single change of removing the requirement to include the license text in derivative works, but I'm not sure if it's more or less required to keep that or what.

 

[n0cmonkey]

Originally posted by: BingBongWongFooey

Kinda weird, it seems that they might not be compatible. However, not for the reasons you're arguing - Are GPL and BSD License really compatible?

That page seems pretty logical to me. But the BSD-lite license seems to have the exact same problem (or am I just an idiot?)

"Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright notice and the following disclaimer."

The GPL doesn't require the disclaimer, so saying that it *requires* the disclaimer makes it incompatible with the GPL as far as I can tell. Hmm. I might have to start investigating this more, looks like the BSD license isn't all it's cracked up to be (or all I thought it was cracked up to be, anyways).

This part:
"Software licenses are not contracts, they are copyright licenses" (it's what the FSF lawyers say). This seems weird to me but I'm not a lawyer, and indeed, it might ruin my argumentation. seems to backup what I have been saying atleast a partially. It mentions that licenses are all about copyright, and if I am correct in assuming you have no rights to someone else's copyrighted material unless they give rights to you (which I think is backed up by the fact you can't take someone's music, sample it, and make something else out of it without permission from the copyright holder of the original music) that you cannot change the license of a piece of code. All together, a BSD licensed piece of code cannot be inserted into a GPLed piece of code because of the viral clause in the GPL itself.

Definitely an interresting page though, and I'll have to look at some of the links there.

edit: on a side not, I've looked through the OSI site and as far as I can tell, all licenses have the flaw of forcing you to reproduce the list of conditions. The MIT license looks closest to what I would consider ideal, with the single change of removing the requirement to include the license text in derivative works, but I'm not sure if it's more or less required to keep that or what.

I think the license text is increadibly important, and should not be discarded from any work. A copyright holder may dual license his code (which is dumb because it basically defeats the purpose of the GPL, IMO), but that is the right of the copyright holder.

 

[Barnaby W. Füi]

Originally posted by: n0cmonkey

edit: on a side not, I've looked through the OSI site and as far as I can tell, all licenses have the flaw of forcing you to reproduce the list of conditions. The MIT license looks closest to what I would consider ideal, with the single change of removing the requirement to include the license text in derivative works, but I'm not sure if it's more or less required to keep that or what.

I think the license text is increadibly important, and should not be discarded from any work. A copyright holder may dual license his code (which is dumb because it basically defeats the purpose of the GPL, IMO), but that is the right of the copyright holder.

I guess what I've been wrong about here is that code licensed under, say, the BSD license, or the X/MIT license, can NOT be GPLed, without the author releasing it under the GPL or specifically allowing you to do so. So you have been right. But I learned something important, so that's okay

I agree that it's important to keep the license text there, I suppose I just wanted to be able to release "hello world" under the BSD license, and somehow let people mess with it and release their work under the GPL or Bob's Chicken License or whatever. I guess what might be appropriate is either:

1) Making a list of licenses (and including their text somewhere within your work), and stating that people can choose whichever license suits them
2) Releasing different "physical" distributions, each with a different license
3) Just releasing it under one license you like and noting that people can contact you if they want it under another license

Oh, and I don't think it defeats the purpose of the GPL. If I write something, and person #1 wants to modify it and release under the BSD license and person #2 wants to modify it and release under the GPL, that makes perfect sense to me. It's not a matter of dual-licensing with the GPL for your own sake, but for others (so they're comfortable with releasing it under a license they like).

 

[n0cmonkey]

Originally posted by: BingBongWongFooey

Originally posted by: n0cmonkey

edit: on a side not, I've looked through the OSI site and as far as I can tell, all licenses have the flaw of forcing you to reproduce the list of conditions. The MIT license looks closest to what I would consider ideal, with the single change of removing the requirement to include the license text in derivative works, but I'm not sure if it's more or less required to keep that or what.

I think the license text is increadibly important, and should not be discarded from any work. A copyright holder may dual license his code (which is dumb because it basically defeats the purpose of the GPL, IMO), but that is the right of the copyright holder.

I guess what I've been wrong about here is that code licensed under, say, the BSD license, or the X/MIT license, can NOT be GPLed, without the author releasing it under the GPL or specifically allowing you to do so. So you have been right. But I learned something important, so that's okay

Yeah, we both learned something. License debates, even fairly civil ones like we had, kill threads. Or maybe it was the fact the debate was civil...

I agree that it's important to keep the license text there, I suppose I just wanted to be able to release "hello world" under the BSD license, and somehow let people mess with it and release their work under the GPL or Bob's Chicken License or whatever. I guess what might be appropriate is either:

1) Making a list of licenses (and including their text somewhere within your work), and stating that people can choose whichever license suits them
2) Releasing different "physical" distributions, each with a different license
3) Just releasing it under one license you like and noting that people can contact you if they want it under another license

Public domain? Use it, abuse it, make it yours. But definitely add in a warrenty disclaimer

Oh, and I don't think it defeats the purpose of the GPL. If I write something, and person #1 wants to modify it and release under the BSD license and person #2 wants to modify it and release under the GPL, that makes perfect sense to me. It's not a matter of dual-licensing with the GPL for your own sake, but for others (so they're comfortable with releasing it under a license they like).

The purpose of the GPL is to keep things open source. Licensing it under the BSD license as well as the GPL destroys that, as in someone can still come in and use your software for a closed source project. Unless you create a dual licensed base and the two camps branch off in fairly different directions...

And remember, our arm chair lawyering probably wouldn't hold up in court. I'd definitely spend the time and money talking to a copyright lawyer about this stuff if I decided to code and release a project. Don't want GPL weenies using my stuff under THEIR terms.

 

[Barnaby W. Füi]

Originally posted by: n0cmonkey

Originally posted by: BingBongWongFooey

Originally posted by: n0cmonkey

edit: on a side not, I've looked through the OSI site and as far as I can tell, all licenses have the flaw of forcing you to reproduce the list of conditions. The MIT license looks closest to what I would consider ideal, with the single change of removing the requirement to include the license text in derivative works, but I'm not sure if it's more or less required to keep that or what.

I think the license text is increadibly important, and should not be discarded from any work. A copyright holder may dual license his code (which is dumb because it basically defeats the purpose of the GPL, IMO), but that is the right of the copyright holder.

I guess what I've been wrong about here is that code licensed under, say, the BSD license, or the X/MIT license, can NOT be GPLed, without the author releasing it under the GPL or specifically allowing you to do so. So you have been right. But I learned something important, so that's okay

Yeah, we both learned something. License debates, even fairly civil ones like we had, kill threads. Or maybe it was the fact the debate was civil...

Well, the thread was about licensing anyways, so I think we are off the hook

I agree that it's important to keep the license text there, I suppose I just wanted to be able to release "hello world" under the BSD license, and somehow let people mess with it and release their work under the GPL or Bob's Chicken License or whatever. I guess what might be appropriate is either:

1) Making a list of licenses (and including their text somewhere within your work), and stating that people can choose whichever license suits them
2) Releasing different "physical" distributions, each with a different license
3) Just releasing it under one license you like and noting that people can contact you if they want it under another license

Public domain? Use it, abuse it, make it yours. But definitely add in a warrenty disclaimer

I remember reading that the Berne convention made it impossible to truly release something into the public domain anymore (maybe just in the US, not sure).

Oh, and I don't think it defeats the purpose of the GPL. If I write something, and person #1 wants to modify it and release under the BSD license and person #2 wants to modify it and release under the GPL, that makes perfect sense to me. It's not a matter of dual-licensing with the GPL for your own sake, but for others (so they're comfortable with releasing it under a license they like).

The purpose of the GPL is to keep things open source. Licensing it under the BSD license as well as the GPL destroys that, as in someone can still come in and use your software for a closed source project. Unless you create a dual licensed base and the two camps branch off in fairly different directions...

Yeah, but the person making changes to it may want to release the entire thing (i.e. the original code, with their changes) under the GPL.

 

[n0cmonkey]

Originally posted by: BingBongWongFooey

Originally posted by: n0cmonkey

Originally posted by: BingBongWongFooey

Originally posted by: n0cmonkey

edit: on a side not, I've looked through the OSI site and as far as I can tell, all licenses have the flaw of forcing you to reproduce the list of conditions. The MIT license looks closest to what I would consider ideal, with the single change of removing the requirement to include the license text in derivative works, but I'm not sure if it's more or less required to keep that or what.

I think the license text is increadibly important, and should not be discarded from any work. A copyright holder may dual license his code (which is dumb because it basically defeats the purpose of the GPL, IMO), but that is the right of the copyright holder.

I guess what I've been wrong about here is that code licensed under, say, the BSD license, or the X/MIT license, can NOT be GPLed, without the author releasing it under the GPL or specifically allowing you to do so. So you have been right. But I learned something important, so that's okay

Yeah, we both learned something. License debates, even fairly civil ones like we had, kill threads. Or maybe it was the fact the debate was civil...

Well, the thread was about licensing anyways, so I think we are off the hook

I agree that it's important to keep the license text there, I suppose I just wanted to be able to release "hello world" under the BSD license, and somehow let people mess with it and release their work under the GPL or Bob's Chicken License or whatever. I guess what might be appropriate is either:

1) Making a list of licenses (and including their text somewhere within your work), and stating that people can choose whichever license suits them
2) Releasing different "physical" distributions, each with a different license
3) Just releasing it under one license you like and noting that people can contact you if they want it under another license

Public domain? Use it, abuse it, make it yours. But definitely add in a warrenty disclaimer

I remember reading that the Berne convention made it impossible to truly release something into the public domain anymore (maybe just in the US, not sure).

Don't know. But you could always do something like: I release all rights to this work. Don't sue me. or something.

 

[drag]

Here's how I figure it.

Now the main reason that you can't simply release something to the public domain, something like just posting it to a anonymous ftp server, is a practical one. What has happened in the past is that someone just takes the code, copyrights it, and sues you for distributing it. Pretty crappy and since you have no proof that it was yours exept for the time stamps on your server it makes it hard to defend your position. People have been burned in the past for this very thing which is why they created BSD and GPL liscence. It's main job is to simply state that hey I made this code and I have a record of it and am willing to make a minimal effort to protect it, which in reality is about all it takes in court, unless your fighting a bueacracy set up to screw you over. Like what MS and freinds have used to destroy companies in the past.

just like patents, liscencing are simply ways to give proof when you want to sue yourself or defend yourself in a lawsuit. That's realy the sole purpose.

But I suppose you'all already got that part.


Now I figure that adding BSD code doesn't invalidate a GPL liscenced product, just as long as they give credit to the creators as stipulated in the BSD liscence. If a private company can legally use BSD code, modify it, and make it propriatory and illigal for anybody else to use the modified versions then it makes sense that you could GPL it it with no problem. It's not like you are going to be restricting the original code or anything like that, anybody can get a copy from the original place just like you did that will still be pure BSD.

(oh I know that BSD wasn't created to compete... it's academic-type liscence, but I just wanted to point out that different Free software liscences are designed for different purposes)

 

[n0cmonkey]

Originally posted by: drag
Here's how I figure it.

Now the main reason that you can't simply release something to the public domain, something like just posting it to a anonymous ftp server, is a practical one. What has happened in the past is that someone just takes the code, copyrights it, and sues you for distributing it. Pretty crappy and since you have no proof that it was yours exept for the time stamps on your server it makes it hard to defend your position. People have been burned in the past for this very thing which is why they created BSD and GPL liscence. It's main job is to simply state that hey I made this code and I have a record of it and am willing to make a minimal effort to protect it, which in reality is about all it takes in court, unless your fighting a bueacracy set up to screw you over. Like what MS and freinds have used to destroy companies in the past.

just like patents, liscencing are simply ways to give proof when you want to sue yourself or defend yourself in a lawsuit. That's realy the sole purpose.

But I suppose you'all already got that part.

Ok, then how about semi-public domain? Copyright it, and give people the right to use it however they want. Just by writing the code, it is copyrighted to you, so that shouldn't be tough.

Now I figure that adding BSD code doesn't invalidate a GPL liscenced product, just as long as they give credit to the creators as stipulated in the BSD liscence.

But the code would then have to be GPLed, and you cannot add restrictions to the license. The GPL has more restrictions.

If a private company can legally use BSD code, modify it, and make it propriatory and illigal for anybody else to use the modified versions then it makes sense that you could GPL it it with no problem.

But the code that the company took was BSD licensed code. It is still BSD licensed code, although their changes may not have to be. Binary distribution is allowed by the license, as explicitly stated in section 2, allowing for the little restriction.

It's not like you are going to be restricting the original code or anything like that, anybody can get a copy from the original place just like you did that will still be pure BSD.

When there are two licenses attatched to the code, it makes sense that you have to obey the more restrictive of the two. But anyways, you are still changing the license on the code that you have taken from a BSD licensed work, which I believe is illegal.

(oh I know that BSD wasn't created to compete... it's academic-type liscence, but I just wanted to point out that different Free software liscences are designed for different purposes)

 

[NaughtyusMaximus]

I was under the impression that and BSD code placed into a GPL'd document would itself stay under the BSD license (and must of course be mentioned as such in the code). This seems to be along the lines of what n0c is saying.