Re: Circumventing the GPL

[Hyman Rosen]

David Kastrup wrote:
> You don't need to become the owner.
> It is enough if you become _responsible_.

Enough for what? I just don't understand what you're
saying. Remember, the GPL is just a copyright license.
It has no notion of responsibility. It states only
whether and how covered software may be conveyed when
copyright law would otherwise forbid it.

The software developers retain the copyright of the
works they create, regardless of who specified the
behavior of the software. Do you disagree with that?

They may sell copies of this software, as long as they
keep to the provisions of the GPL, which they do by
sending a copy of the source with each copy of the binary.
Do you disagree with that?

The buyers of this software may in turn sell the copy
they received, without requiring any license at all, at
least in the U.S., because of the first sale doctrine.
They may sell the binary part without the source part.
Do you disagree with that?

Now these secondary buyers have no one from whom to
demand source code. The developers have discharged their
GPL obligations by shipping source to the first buyers.
The first buyers who resold the software don't have any
obligations at all - they may as well have sold a book
to a used-book store. Do you disagree with that?