Re: Significance of the GP licence.

[David Kastrup]

RJack <user@example.net> writes:

> Alan Mackenzie wrote:
>
>> Well there's little prospect of that experiment taking place,
>> thankfully.
>
> The GPL is gasping for breath Alan. It'll soon be DEAD. Get over it
> Alan. "Copyleft" style licenses are unenforceable under U.S. law.

Quite right, since they are no contracts and the recipient did not sign
them.  And the GPL says so itself.  But that does not change that
_copyright_ stays enforceable, and while that is the case, a license
like the GPL which gives conditions for additional permissions is likely
welcome to the recipients of software.

Once copyright falls, the GPL is a piece of toilet paper, while the
"licenses" like shrink-wrap and click-through which require the
recipient to agree to obnoxious restrictions on the rights that would
properly be his under copyright, will still be able to affect people who
did agree to be bound in that manner.

> You may, perhaps, continue to extol the virtues of the GPL under the
> patchwork of laws of Europe but it's dead in the USA.

Stay away from your keyboard during your wet dreams.

-- 
David Kastrup