Copyrights and GPL - perhaps IBM should hang on to copyrights in future [LWN.net]

Copyrights and GPL - perhaps IBM should hang on to copyrights in future

Posted Sep 26, 2003 19:06 UTC (Fri) by namaseit (guest, #13940)
In reply to: Copyrights and GPL - perhaps IBM should hang on to copyrights in future by LinuxLobbyist
Parent article: IBM Files New Claims Against SCO in Linux Case (Dow Jones)

I do see your point as well, mine is just the as of that quote from groklaw above. I see it that even though you have assigned your copyright to FSF that in the event of breach of contract (GPL) that the auther may still pursue damages. Which I was replying to , "When they do that, they are no longer the legal owners of that work, so they can't file a misappropriation complaint for such code."

From what groklaw stated, the author's do not lose that copyright.
"Releasing software under the GPL is not the same as releasing it into the public domain. Authors retain their copyrights to software licensed under the GPL. Even when authors assign their copyrights to someone else, such as to the Free Software Foundation, the copyrights remain valid, but with the new owner. Therefore, subsequent to termination of your permissions under the GPL, you are in the unhappy position of violating the copyrights of the software authors, if you continue to distribute their software. Under copyright law, you are not allowed to distribute at all without their permission -- and they have chosen to grant that permission only by means of the GPL."

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Copyrights and GPL - perhaps IBM should hang on to copyrights in future

Posted Sep 26, 2003 20:15 UTC (Fri) by Ross (subscriber, #4065) [Link]

Yes, but the text you are quoting is not talking about the situation you are talking about. It is talking about using the GPL. SCO had claimed
that Linux people were saying that the GPL forced the author to assign
copyrights. It doesn't. But of course we weren't saying the GPL did
that either.

SCO was confused about the requirements of the GPL, or at least pretended
to be confused about them.

The part of the Groklaw quote that does talk about assignments is only
saying that they don't destroy copyrights, only transfer them. That is
of course true, but not relevent to the issue of who can file lawsuits
after a copyright has been assigned to the FSF.

Copyrights and GPL - perhaps IBM should hang on to copyrights in future

Posted Sep 27, 2003 0:13 UTC (Sat) by dwalters (guest, #4207) [Link]

The Groklaw quote you mentioned:
you are in the unhappy position of violating the copyrights of the software author

is not 100% correct. More accurately, I believe it should read:
you are in the unhappy position of violating the copyrights of the copyright holder

Of course, most of the time, the author and the copyright holder are one and the same person.