Theo de Raadt wrote:
For the record -- I was right and the Linux developers cannot change
the licenses in any of those ways proposed in those diffs, or that
conversation (http://lkml.org/lkml/2007/8/28/157).
It is illegal to modify a license unless you are the owner/author,
because it is a legal document.
With respect to both you and Eban, I would disagree..
The law requires complying with the license not preserving it.
The license is a part of the copyrighted work.
It grants users rights beyond those of copyright law.
The ISC License requires little more than preserving the copyright
notice, not the license itself,
And even that I would think is redundant as removing a copyright
notice would likely violate copyright law.
BSD Licensed code has found its way into proprietary products, with
no availability of source - and no preservation
of license.
The claim of the Free Software people has always been that BSD is a
"License to Steal"
I am not happy that the work of BSD developers is in essence being
co-opted by Linux developers.
To me it seems lacking in integrity for the GPL crowd to do to the
BSD crowd what they have gone to great
pains to prevent anyone doing to them. It certainly violates the
golden rule.
BUT I am having a hard time convincing myself that taking BSD/ISC
Licensed code - and relicensing it while preservng the
copyright notice, violates the BSD/ISC License.
Whether it is honest or not, it still seems to conform to my
understanding of both the spirit and the letter of the license.
BSD advocates claim their license is more free because it allows you
to do most anything with BSD code.
Am I missing the part where that freedom includes removing the
license ?
How is what Linux developers seem to be doing less legal or ethical
that what many commercial developers have already done ?
If this is not one of the freedom's of BSD Licensed code, then
craft your license to prohibit it.
If I am mis-understanding the license I appologize, but my view of
this dispute is that Linux developers are unethically and immorally,
but quite legally doing to BSD Licensed code pretty much what the
BSD License allows them to.
