[DUG] Open source licences

[Kyley Harris]

Yes, you are saying that you abide by piracy as being ok if not caught?

Just because I release something for free to the public, doesn't mean I am
allowing you to take it for the purpose of making a profit. Patenting an  
idea does
not mean that you intend to charge for it. It means that you have decided  
on the correct
path for your IT property to follow.

The whole point of the license is to create large quanities of quality  
free software
alternatives, not to allow people who cant do it themselves profit from  
the idea, by
wrapping and selling to people who didn't know better.

It is no different than finding a cure for cancer, and releasing the  
information
as long as you don't charge for the cure. Its called helping mankind.
If you tried to make a profit you'd be in court real fast.

There are plenty of GPL cases in court who win. just follow the newspapers  
to see them.

I would love to see someone recompile Linux with a new branding and call  
it DamnGood OS and
sell it for $100 a copy. Does anyone seriously think Linus wouldn't see  
you in court?


By the way. All newspapers do have copyrights. Infact all written word is  
copyright by default,
and if you took that text from a newspaper and reprinted it within the  
legal boundaries of plagurism
you'd be screwed there too.

Being Free makes is worthless? then why would you want to use it. Its not  
free. It has a license which
has conditions. Those conditions set a non-monetary worth on the work. Not  
everything is valued by dollars.
Think of it like a priceless painting; not being able to price it does not  
make it worthless. You also cant
make copies and sell it without permission either.

As far as being unaware....... come on. If you find $100 bucks on the road  
you are legally obliged to hand it
into the cops. I bet you don't, but you are breaking a law. Common Sense  
law. Nothing is free unless you have
a contract stating its free. Thats the default interpretation.




On Wed, 07 Dec 2005 15:55:35 +1300, Grant Brown <grant at sitedoc.com.au>  
wrote:

> Hi to all,
>
> I have kept an eye on this thread with some interest, and whilst I am  
> not a lawyer I don't believe that open source licenses of any nature  
> would stand up in court.
>
> Nor do I think much of click through license agreements. You need a  
> written and signed contract not an action to form the basis of an  
> agreement.
>
> After the agreement has been enacted by way of signing by all parties  
> then yes actions matter but not before. This certainly applies to  
> construction contracts, however OS's may be different.
>
> Being open source the code in question by default is placed in a public  
> forum, which I would have thought negates the license.
>
> If that were not the case then every newspaper in the world would  
> attract a license agreement.
>
> Being open source (ie free) then the code has no value so there can be  
> no loss by the owner, hence no claim for loss.
>
> The other interesting point is that if you are going to place code in  
> open source, then why place any kind of agreement on it at all, kind of  
> defeats the purpose.
>
> Also where does the agreement start, anyone could just say the code was  
> given to them and did not download it from the owners site and hence not  
> agreed to any sort of license.
>
> Has any open source license ever been tested in court, it would be  
> interesting to read the transcript.
>
> As I said before I'm not a lawyer, but I think one would be very hard  
> pressed to run a case based upon open source code and some sort of  
> perceived loss due to a end user agreement.
>
> My personal view is that if something is provided as open source then  
> its open source, not open source with a huge "BUT" attached.
>



-- 
Kyley Harris
+64-21-671821