if copyright assignment is so evil, why don't you oppose FSF requiring it? [LWN.net]

if copyright assignment is so evil, why don't you oppose FSF requiring it?

Posted Feb 2, 2010 9:32 UTC (Tue) by rahulsundaram (subscriber, #21946)
In reply to: if copyright assignment is so evil, why don't you oppose FSF requiring it? by jmm82
Parent article: Canonical copyright assignment policy 'same as others' (ITWire)

I dont see any intersection and I have yet to see a single lawyer claim that
copyright assignment is actually necessary in the case of Linux kernel even
assuming kernel developers want to shift to GPLv3 which they dont and also
copyright assignment to a corporation is different to a non profit foundation
with counter guarantees within the legal agreement to not make it proprietary

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if copyright assignment is so evil, why don't you oppose FSF requiring it?

Posted Feb 2, 2010 13:45 UTC (Tue) by hppnq (subscriber, #14462) [Link]

That's ... ironic. The angle of Evil Company's profit from Innocent Hacker's hard work does not really make sense, because it assumes the conditions under which patches were contributed were not understood. Anyone who chooses a license should do so carefully, whatever the license says.

Some kernel contributors have explicitly stipulated that their code should only be distributed under the GPLv2 and NOT any later version, and you seem to be saying that this is not only a wrong interpretation, but also not a problem. Maybe I misunderstood.

But more importantly: free software really is a bit more than just the GPL. It allows for proprietary software. If you don't like where a particular piece of software is going, you can fork it. This is true for all free software projects.

if copyright assignment is so evil, why don't you oppose FSF requiring it?

Posted Feb 2, 2010 13:55 UTC (Tue) by rahulsundaram (subscriber, #21946) [Link]

No you have category misunderstood what I have been saying I never used
the word evil but it is important to note the clear differences between a
non profit foundation like FSF which offers counter guarantees and a for
profit company and the nature of differences between the copyright
licensing agreements

Whether individual kernel contributors have licensed it under GPLv2 only
or not may or may not be a problem That depends on the specific code in
question which might not even be copyrightable individually There has
been legal arguments placed which have evaluated workaround for such
things discussed in LWN as well before I encourage people to look those
up

Nobody claimed Free software was merely GPL but it is important to note
that permissively licensed code is equally permissive to everybody but
copyright assignments create special privileges to one entity which is a
different case and potential contributors shouldn't be fooled by merely
looking at the license without carefully evaluating whether the terms of
the copyright license agreements are ok with them

if copyright assignment is so evil, why don't you oppose FSF requiring it?

Posted Feb 3, 2010 3:15 UTC (Wed) by jmm82 (guest, #59425) [Link]

If the Linux kernel DID want to change its license it would an interesting
scene to say the least.

If copyright assignment of the Linux kernel had been given to the FSF then
the Linux kernel would most likely be gplv3 now. So non-profit or profit
assignment is assignment. There wouldn't be assignment if some rights were
not lost.

if copyright assignment is so evil, why don't you oppose FSF requiring it?

Posted Feb 3, 2010 3:21 UTC (Wed) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]

if the kernel copyrights had been signed over to the FSF, that code would definitely be GPLv3 right now, even over the objections of the developers. Given how opposed many of those developers are, it would probably have triggered a fork in the kernel.