Re: GPL and other licences

[David Kastrup]

"Alfred M\. Szmidt" <ams@gnu.org> writes:

>    Remember that the point Alfred was making is that because the
>    software is licensed under the GPL, he is allowed to make a copy
>    _even_ if the CD is not his property and he was acting as an agent
>    of licensee/owner of the copy. To him, the license is a magical
>    property attached to the software, and not an agreement between
>    licensor and licensee.
>
> It depends on the license.  The GPL gives an explicity right for
> this,

Nonsense.  The GPL can't dictate that people may access my physical
copies of software.

> some other licenses may not.  If I'm in the legal possession of
> GPLed software, maybe because my employer gave me an CD to use and
> install that specific program, then I'm also allowed to redistribute
> it.

Not if you are not owning it.

> The employeer cannot state that I cannot do this, since the GPL
> gives me this right.

The GPL can only give the owner of a copy rights.

>    I think that employees do not have any rights to their employer's
>    property, whatever the conditions were under which it was
>    acquired.
>
> Even if the employer sold that property to the employee?

Of course not (in that case, owership of the employer ceases).  And
the employer might also _grant_ the employee copying GPLed software
from the company's media.  The GPL gives the _employer_ the right to
do so.

But the employee can't take this right for granted.

> (Note that my example was different, and more akin to person A
> giving a gratis copy of a CD to person B; David AFAIK claims that
> person A can still dictate what person B is allowed to do with the
> content.  I claim that David is wrong)

As long as the copy remains the property of person A and person B acts
only as agent of person A, yes, person A dictates all the terms under
which person B might make use of person A's physical property.

You really don't get internal use.

-- 
David Kastrup, Kriemhildstr. 15, 44793 Bochum