Joint ownership of copyright is a problem

Joint ownership of copyright is a problem

Posted Apr 20, 2005 12:41 UTC (Wed) by utoddl (subscriber, #1232)
In reply to: Lack of developers delays OpenOffice.org (ComputerWorld) by JoeBuck
Parent article: Lack of developers delays OpenOffice.org (ComputerWorld)

Now, one nice thing about Sun's assignment terms is that, after it is executed, the contributor and Sun both retain copyright.

So Sun says Joe Thirdparty can't use the code you wrote, and you say he can. This puts you and Sun at legal odds, and suddenly the "nice thing" is not so nice anymore. In fact, it's just as if it belongs only to Sun 'cause they have more legal resources than JoeBuck has to draw on.

Clear transfer to the FSF, without waffling about whether the code becomes proprietary later, is for most people a much better way to ensure the code stays Free.

Go ahead, ask IBM why they don't contribute to OOo. The answer pretty much pulls the rug out from under Sun's open governance ruse.

Please note that I'm not saying that Sun is wrong for choosing the terms that they did, it's just that these terms will tend to limit Sun's competitors' incentive to contribute.

It also limits Sun's customers' incentive to contribute.

---

(Log in to post comments)