Am Freitag, 27. August 2010, 22:15:24 schrieb Jaroslav Hajek: > On Fri, Aug 27, 2010 at 10:01 PM, Martin Helm <[email protected]> wrote: > > Am Freitag, 27. August 2010, 21:39:49 schrieb Jaroslav Hajek: > >> The BSD allows adding restrictions; GPL does not. So much the facts. > > > > I know that. My comment was the following hope more clearly (and this is > > not restricted to the discussion about this special website at MC): > > > > How do you or I or anyone else by looking at a code which contains a > > license (be it BSD or GPL or whatever else) know if one is allowed to > > use it according to that license which is mentioned in the code if you > > cannot trace all the places where it was ever uploaded and then > > downloaded and uploaded and distributed again and knowing for every such > > site the ToS to judge that on this unknown way the code took there was a > > place where the ToS was violated, when it is not mentioned in the > > license? > > You do not know that from looking at the source codes license, I do not > > know that and nobody else. > > No, you don't. Neither you know whether someone replaced or modified > the license in the sources. > > > Following the logic that such thing is possible means: Stop using any > > free software license immediately you never can know if you do not > > violate a ToS which is not mentioned in the license. > > No, thank you, I won't, I'll just trust my instincts. But you knew that ;) > > >> If you wish, search the previous discussion on this topic. Basically, > >> there were two fundamental questions: > >> > >> 1. Whether it is legal to add restrictions to BSD code when it's > >> redistributed without modifications. > >> 2. Whether it is legal to add such restrictions through an external > >> ToS agreement. > > > > I allready read this discussions as I follow them for a long time now > > (and also several years on different places). Either there exist free > > open source licenses and they are valid or they are worthless. > > Such licenses exist, that's a fact.
Of course they exist and of course I make use of them (since 1990) and luckily many other people, no question. I just wanted to provoke a bit the question what it really means to put additional restrictions (in that case by mathworks) onto a license without including that restrictions in the license itself and what such a thing really means to a user sitting in front of such a license and the code without knowing exactly the way it took before (this restrictions would - if included - of course be valid for the case of a BSD and I think also for a MIT license and maybe that is anyway the next step they take - just some wild speculation from my side). I also would not include such a piece of code into a FOSS like Gnu Octave (or some other FOSS) and I do not really want to be misinterpreted that I would advocate such an inclusion (all what I say is anyway only a personal and private point of view from an octave user, since I am not in any form part of such a decision process) even if I would give a arm and a leg to ensure that it is legal (but I am not a lawyer). It is anyway the best thing to ask the original author to contribute to octave if s/he is interested. Btw sorry that this discussion was now somewhat off topic. - Martin ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Sell apps to millions through the Intel(R) Atom(Tm) Developer Program Be part of this innovative community and reach millions of netbook users worldwide. Take advantage of special opportunities to increase revenue and speed time-to-market. Join now, and jumpstart your future. http://p.sf.net/sfu/intel-atom-d2d _______________________________________________ Octave-dev mailing list [email protected] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/octave-dev
