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GPL "v2 or later" may prevent merging back modifications? in practice, yes

GPL "v2 or later" may prevent merging back modifications? in practice, yes

Posted Oct 2, 2006 17:17 UTC (Mon) by stevenj (guest, #421)
In reply to: GPL "v2 or later" may prevent merging back modifications? in practice, yes by stevenj
Parent article: Busy busy busybox

Lest you misunderstand me again, by "one can come up with much worse fears" I meant "one can come up with much worse fears in this context".

In case you haven't noticed, throughout this entire thread I've focused exclusively on the context of the "or any later version" permission. I believe this is clear if you read each posting in its entirety, as opposed to snipping out isolated phrases. (You're acting like I said, "Well, nuclear war is a much worse fear," when I said no such thing, and if you read what I wrote this is clearly not what I meant.)

Ingo, native English speakers rely on context and good-faith readers/listeners in order to make themselves understood. Only lawyers have to be careful to precisely turn every phrase to avoid any possible ambiguity, because lawyers have to prepare for people who deal in bad faith. Please don't make people who deal with you write like lawyers.


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GPL "v2 or later" may prevent merging back modifications? in practice, yes

Posted Oct 2, 2006 17:41 UTC (Mon) by bronson (subscriber, #4806) [Link]

You said, Only lawyers have to be careful to precisely turn every phrase to avoid any possible ambiguity...

And yet you yourself have spent much of your time nit-picking Ingo's language and have mostly ignored his very clear intent.

Bull

Posted Oct 2, 2006 18:19 UTC (Mon) by stevenj (guest, #421) [Link]

And yet you yourself have spent much of your time nit-picking Ingo's language

Bull. All through this thread I've tried to stay on-topic regarding whether using "v2 or later" permission opens you up to some vague and terrible legal risks, and whether the FSF is fulfilling these fears with GPLv3 (separate from whether you agree with v3's changes).

Ingo posted exactly once in this thread (so far), and his points were (a) misreading my post to claim that I was not taking the phrase "worst fears" in the context of this permission, (b) making unfounded and irrelevant ad hominem attacks.

And I note that your post made not a single substantive point about the license language. Why are people so intent on changing the subject?

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