[linux-audio-user] Re: distorting Linuxsampler

Fernando Lopez-Lezcano nando at ccrma.Stanford.EDU
Sun Apr 23 20:23:43 EDT 2006


On Fri, 2006-04-21 at 01:14 +0100, Rui Nuno Capela wrote:
> Gene Heskett wrote:
> > On Thursday 20 April 2006 11:03, Dave Phillips wrote:
> >> Frank Barknecht wrote:
> >>> According to their words: "COMMERCIAL USE of the souce code,
> >>> libraries and applications is NOT ALLOWED without prior written
> >>> permission by the LinuxSampler authors" no professional musician is
> >>> allowed to use LinuxSampler except with a written permission.
> >> Frank, where did you get this text ? It's not the text I quoted from
> >> the LS README :
> >>
> >> "The LinuxSampler library (liblinuxsampler) and its applications are
> >> distributed under the terms of the GNU General Public License (see
> >> COPYING file), but with the EXCEPTION that they may NOT be used in
> >> COMMERCIAL software or hardware products without prior written
> >> authorization by the authors."
> > 
> > Its my understanding of the GPL that you CANNOT apply additional 
> > restrictions and still call it "GPL".
> > 
> > I'd suggest they consult with an attorney before they write such 
> > foolery.
> > 
> >> This is from recent CVS sources.
>
> People, please calm down.
> 
> I gotta repeat my own understanding of this issue, but I think it all
> boils down to this:
> 
> a) linuxsampler-0.3.3 is the last known public release; as is, its pure
> GPL, everyone if free to fork it according to FSF legalese ;)

This is not the first time I see something like this posted on the
lists, sigh:

--------
> tar
xvjf /projects/planet/source/rpms/linuxsampler/linuxsampler-0.3.3.tar.bz2
> cd linuxsampler-0.3.3
> more README
  LinuxSampler - modular, streaming capable sampler
  
  by Benno Senoner (benno at gardena.net)
  and Christian Schoenebeck (cuse at users.sourceforge.net)
  
  This software is distributed under the GNU General Public License (see
  COPYING file), and may not be used in commercial applications
  without asking the authors for permission.
--------

so, AFAIK 0.3.3 is already not really GPL for the reasons already listed
in the thread. 

Maybe I have the wrong tarball? (BTW, try to download 0.3.3 - let me
know how you manage to do that). If you go to the CVS site and browse
the 0.3.3 release branch you get the same thing in the README. 

> b) linuxsampler CVS HEAD (IOW, all source code in CVS since 0.3.3
> release) is the one which The-Rather-Illegal-GPL-Exception applies;
> thats actually intentional; if you're a distro packager, do NOT pick it!
> being you debianese or not :) unless you get the explicit LS-devel
> permission to do it, of course, as stated on the infamous exception.
> 
> Is that clear?

Not really, I keep seeing the above referenced README in 0.3.3. So,
unless I'm missing something, please stop saying that this is only
happening in CVS. 

-- Fernando





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