Java cryptography and free distributions [LWN.net]

Java cryptography and free distributions

Posted Mar 16, 2007 20:01 UTC (Fri) by landley (guest, #6789)
Parent article: Java cryptography and free distributions

If sun is the only copyright holder in java, then you can't enforce the
license against it (you haven't got standing, only a copyright holder can
sue to enforce the license).

So all this means is that Sun can't afford to accept third party
contributions from the open source community into Java, or else those
contributors could then enforce the license against it and sue it for the
key. But they can release it under any license they want because they
don't need the license to distribute so violating its' terms means
nothing
to them.

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Java cryptography and free distributions

Posted Mar 16, 2007 20:43 UTC (Fri) by giraffedata (subscriber, #1954) [Link]

So all this means is that Sun can't afford to accept third party contributions from the open source community into Java,

Sun can't afford to accept third party contributions under GPL3. Whether Sun redistributes under GPL3 or some other license is irrelevant to Sun's obligation to divulge keys even with third party contributions.

BTW, you don't enforce a license. A license is permission and can't be used against anyone but the licensor. You enforce copyright. More specifically, you can enforce conditions of a copyright license.