Re: GPL traitor !

[Hyman Rosen]

Joerg Schilling wrote:
> Linking different works together does not create a derived work as
> this is an automated process that cannot add creation, but creation
> is needed in order to create a derived work.

US copyright law <http://www.copyright.gov/title17/circ92.pdf> does not
contain the concept of "derived work". It contains the concept of
"derivative work",
    a work based upon one or more preexisting works, such as a translation,
    musical arrangement, dramatization, fictionalization, motion picture
    version, sound recording, art reproduction, abridgment, condensation,
    or any other form in which a work may be recast, transformed, or adapted.
    A work consisting of editorial revisions, annotations, elaborations, or
    other modifications, which, as a whole, represent an original work of
    authorship, is a “derivative work”.
but a linked program is not a derivative work because it is not a
transformation of the existing works.

US copyright law also contains the concept of a "collective work",
    a work, such as a periodical issue, anthology, or encyclopedia, in which
    a number of contributions, constituting separate and independent works in
    themselves, are assembled into a collective whole.
and a statically linked executable fits this definition perfectly.

US copyright law also states (page 114)
    (c) Contributions to Collective Works.—
    Copyright in each separate contribution to a collective work is distinct
    from copyright in the collective work as a whole, and vests initially in
    the author of the contribution. In the absence of an express transfer of
    the copyright or of any rights under it, the owner of copyright in the
    collective work is presumed to have acquired only the privilege of
    reproducing and distributing the contribution as part of that particular
    collective work, any revision of that collective work, and any later
    collective work in the same series.

We see that the creator of a collective work must have the permission
of the copyright holders of the components to include them, and this is
separate from any other permission that the rights holders may have granted.