Re: Copyright Misuse Doctrine in Apple v. Psystar

[Alan Mackenzie]

In gnu.misc.discuss Alexander Terekhov <terekhov@web.de> wrote:
> 
> Alan Mackenzie wrote:
> [...]
>> The GPL was formulated by experienced lawyers, with good understanding
>> of copyright and contract law.  Do bear in mind that the law doesn't
>> always mean what it seems to to the legally inexperienced.
> 
> http://oreilly.com/openbook/freedom/ch09.html

> "Mark Fischer, a Boston attorney specializing in intellectual-property
> law, recalls discussing the license with Stallman during this period.
> "Richard had very strong views about how it should work," Fischer says,
> "He had two principles. The first was to make the software absolutely as
> open as possible. The second was to encourage others to adopt the same
> licensing practices." 

> Encouraging others to adopt the same licensing practices meant closing
> off the escape hatch that had allowed privately owned versions of Emacs
> to emerge. To close that escape hatch, Stallman and his free software
> colleagues came up with a solution: users would be free to modify GNU
> Emacs just so long as they published their modifications. In addition,
> the resulting "derivative" works would also have carry the same GNU
> Emacs License. 

> The revolutionary nature of this final condition would take a while to
> sink in. At the time, Fischer says, he simply viewed the GNU Emacs
> License as a simple contract. It put a price tag on GNU Emacs' use.
> Instead of money, Stallman was charging users access to their own later
> modifications. That said, Fischer does remember the contract terms as
> unique. 

> "I think asking other people to accept the price was, if not unique,
> highly unusual at that time," he says. "

> What say you now, Alan?

Having gone through all of that, I say that the GPL was formulated by
experienced lawyers with a good understanding of copyright and contract
law.  What've Mark Fischer's recollections, splendid chap though he may
be, got to do with it?

> Here's more:

[ snip several hundred lines whose relevance to the thread is at best
  obscure. ]

No thanks.

> regards,
> alexander.

-- 
Alan Mackenzie (Nuremberg, Germany).