On Saturday 31 August 2002 02:02 pm, Shachar Shemesh wrote: > Eric Pouech wrote: > >my point is: > >- a company X has an audio player for Win32 > >- company X ports its app to Wine using the wine source, and it's mp3 > >player and makes a closed package of it > >- it'll have to pay for the license > >so I think this has to be documented somehow > > > >A+ > > Isn't it always the case with Open Source software that, when you want > to repackage a piece of code, patent licensing requirements are yours to > figure out and comply? Why is this case any different than the Unisys > LZW patent, when free (bear) implementations were free of charge?
Well, yes, but it should probably be disclosed somewhere in the readme and/or the license file. You don't want people to encounter this after they've ported and released stuff, right? Wine is not legally OBLIGATED to find patent dependencies, but I think that developers should make an effort to document known/possible patent issues. It's not that hard, just put a notice in the documentation somewhere. Note: I am not a lawyer, so this is just my opinion and not legal advice. -- -- Igor