4 Jul
2006
4 Jul
'06
3:49 p.m.
On Tue, 2006-07-04 at 09:32 +0100, Rui Nuno Capela wrote:
On Mon, July 3, 2006 22:55, Dave Robillard wrote:
I think you're missing the point. Current CVS LS *IS* effectively
GPLed.
If a company wanted to use recent CVS LS in a commercial product right
now, and did, there's no way you'd be able to do anything about it.
There's a bunch of files in CVS that say right in them they're GPLed,
and they point to a COPYING file which is the GPL, verbatim. There's
not a lawyer in the world that would say a vague webpage disclaimer or
README file (neither of which you actually need to see to get at the
source code) overrides that.
On Mon, 2006-07-03 at 08:33 -0400, Paul Davis
wrote:
We already know that the LS license is currently flawed. As Christian
wrote explicitly, even thought the README file still has the infamous
exception wording, *ALL* public releases of LinuxSampler until and
including 0.3.3 *ARE* plain GPL. That last public release was more than
one year ago. Since then, LinuxSampler code in CVS has changed in many
pervasive ways, and AFAICT for the better, performance and feature-wise. On Mon, 2006-07-03 at 02:26 +0700, Patrick
Shirkey wrote:
Everyone can make assumptions about what they can or can't do until the
cows come home, but it's irrelevant. The point it the license needs
clarification.
The disclaimer in the README is along the lines of what they intend to
say (judging by the previously pasted quotes). The disclaimer on the
webpage clearly makes it illegal to use LS on a CD you intend to sell, or
in public concerts you sell tickets to (a goal that is specifically
mentioned on the About page I might add), so if that isn't the intention
it should be fixed. There is no disclaimer on the source files at all, so
those are pure GPL with no commercial restrictions whatsoever.
What IS the license to LinuxSampler? Who knows. They certainly havn't
told us.
If they really want to get people to give money
then they should just
make it so that you have to pay or contribute code/time for a while
to get access to the newest downloads from their site. Keep the stable
version far enough behind the development version that people will
pay to get the newest code base.
its really rather amusing to see people speculating on what the
developers of LS could or could not do, when the actual relevant
"encounter" with "commercial interests" has *already* happened. it
did
not go well. it can be tempting to imagine that we understand the
motivations of commercial organizations and can therefore offer them
appropriate carrots. don't be so confident of this. both the LS
developers and myself are under the terms of an NDA, so it is not
possible to discuss with any relevant detail precisely what happened.
but it was nasty, it was unpleasant and as i've said before, it would
be better for people to not make so many assumptions about their ability
to guess at what might or might happen when a commercial company shows
interest in a tool like LS. From the sounds of it whatever company caused this
isn't very friendly..
would you put it past them? You think you're covering
your ass but
you're not wearing any pants ;)
I strongly believe (although I'm also speculating
here;) the next public
release of LinuxSampler, whenever it will be ready, will come with a
proper open-source license. And I pretty guess it will be pure GPL but I
just cannot garantee that yet ;)
Cheers,
-DR-