Date: Tue, 9 Feb 1999 00:18:43 +0000 (GMT) From: Terry Lambert <tlambert@primenet.com> To: des@flood.ping.uio.no (Dag-Erling Smorgrav) Cc: jooji@webnology.com, brett@lariat.org, grog@lemis.com, pfgiffun@bachue.usc.unal.edu.co, gsutter@pobox.com, chat@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: GPL *again* (was: New CODA release) Message-ID: <199902090018.RAA01928@usr06.primenet.com> In-Reply-To: <xzpww1tlyt5.fsf@flood.ping.uio.no> from "Dag-Erling Smorgrav" at Feb 8, 99 04:06:46 pm
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> > Yes, but realize there that people who use the BSD license are making a > > rational decision to give away valuable work. People who use GPL simply > > don't want anyone else to take their valuable, freely-given work, close > > the development, add proprietary extensions, and make gobs of money. > > If that was really their only motivation, they'd use something > non-contagious. The contagion element of the GPL buys the developer > nothing; it's there solely to prevent other people from making money > from their own hard work. Ugh. People really need to read the thing, and the manifesto, more carefully. The reasoning behind putting something out under the GPL is force the contagion. They want the contagion, since it means they can benefit from the changes others make to their code, since the contaigin forces them to give the modified code back to the original author (if the author asks for it). A side effect of the contagion is that it is a two edged sword: once someone gives you GPL'ed modifications and you roll them in, you *can't* relicense the code under another license, if you include the modifications. This is the downside that people don't see until they graduate and have worked as a wage-slave for someone else, and find that they can't use their own code to start their own company because the code is inextricably tied up. Terry Lambert terry@lambert.org --- Any opinions in this posting are my own and not those of my present or previous employers. To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message
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