Re: Copyright issues

[Hans Aberg]

On 8 Sep 2009, at 16:51, Reinhold Kainhofer wrote:

> > > Can you please read the GNU GPL before spreading too much nonsense?
> >
> > It is not about the GPL, but the WIPO copyright treaty, and copyright
> > law. The GPL cannot override that.
>
> gs is GPL v3+, so anything that links to it has to be compatible to  
> GPL v3.

The GPL 3.0 now contains the following quote. It looks to me as saying  
that for linking, the interface must be made public, but does not say  
anything about the program itself. Read yourself to see if you agree  
with my interpretation. I brought up this point with RMS - the things  
is that copyright roughly speaking protects the distribution of the  
parts that are humanly creatively unique (suggested by the Beastie  
flute sample case). But it is not possible for one copyright license  
to interfere with another copyright ownership.

----
The "Corresponding Source" for a work in object code form means all  
the source code needed to generate, install, and (for an executable  
work) run the object code and to modify the work, including scripts to  
control those activities. However, it does not include the work's  
System Libraries, or general-purpose tools or generally available free  
programs which are used unmodified in performing those activities but  
which are not part of the work. For example, Corresponding Source  
includes interface definition files associated with source files for  
the work, and the source code for shared libraries and dynamically  
linked subprograms that the work is specifically designed to require,  
such as by intimate data communication or control flow between those  
subprograms and other parts of the work.
----
> Lilypond doesn't link, but simply call it, so there's no restriction  
> here.

That is what I say: the form is looser, so it should be less  
complicated and controversial.

The WIPO copyright treaty says that programs are protected as literary  
works in the sense od the Berne convention. So think about books. So  
this situation is more like a bookstore wanting to sell a book package.

> However, as the installer also bundles gs, the provisions about  
> distributing
> copies of gs found in the GPL v3 have to be fulfilled. Section "6.  
> Conveying
> Non-Source Forms." is about distributing compiled versions, but I  
> don't see
> any further restrictions there (source code available, etc, of  
> course).
>
> So, what's the problem here?

Yes, this is what I also said. In your redistribution, you must make  
sure that you fulfill the copyright conditions, in as much as they do  
not abrogate local copyright law, of the individual packages.

If GPL was able to impose conditions of other software components,  
then it would not be possible to distribute GPL'd Bison with BSD'd  
Flex, and not would Mac OS X be possible, which contains many GPL'd  
components along with some which actually are closed source.

  Hans