Ben Reser said on Mon, Dec 15, 2003 at 10:27:35PM -0800,: > He may be hired by a commercial software firm who pays him a large > sum of money to turn the application closed source and work on it
Ah, well. You are right. Bu the loss is not for ever. But, other persons can always take the code which is already available under the GPL, and work on it. The original authors' subsequent modifications are no longer available though. Ditto about the fears about GPL 3 going the GFDL way. If existing software under the present GPL is relicensed under a (unjustifiably feared non free) new GPL, users can continue to use the code base available under the older (present version) -- remember, the GPL vests the option to use a later version of the GPL in the user; not the copyright holder. That is the safety of the GPL. -- +~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~+ Mahesh T. Pai, LL.M., 'NANDINI', S. R. M. Road, Ernakulam, Cochin-682018, Kerala, India. http://in.geocities.com/paivakil +~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~+ -- license-discuss archive is at http://crynwr.com/cgi-bin/ezmlm-cgi?3