Re: BTW, have you been to PN latelly?

On Fri, 05 Mar 2004 09:40:03 +0000, Jason Judge wrote:

> 
> "Murilo Pinto" <xaraya-Mm/[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]
>> It's GPL discussion all over again.
> 
> Lol. That's not discussion. It's the usual slanging match and
> rattle-throwing, devoid of any real statement of the facts.
> 
> The underlying worry about that situation, is that many users of
> [alledgedly] GPL-violated code are chipping in with "we don't care if the
> GPL has been violated - that person has done lots of really good things
> for us, so we should let them carry on". IMO that is wrong - the GPL is
> much more fundamental than that, and serves to protect everybody all the
> time, not just when we feel like it.
> 
> -- JJ

Its actually a bigger problem than that.
There is a section in the GPL (section 4 iirc) that states you cannot
sublicense or relicense GPL code. By granting permission for someone to
ignore sections of the GPL you are doing exactly that. In effect breaking
the GPL yourself.

This is why projects like mozilla triple license their code - MPL, LGPL
and commercial license for those that pay ;-)

The whole argument over whether modules and themes can or can not be
closed source is a bit of a pointless one. Noone knows the answer except a
bunch of lawyers and strangely they seem to be the one group that no one
has asked :-)

Maybe the FSF should give a ruling on it, but I think I can bet which way
theyd rule - if in doubt theyd say it was all GPL, but thats hardly
surprising :)

If a framework project wants to allow commercial modules and themes the
best and safest way for all concerned is to either dual license, or
change the license to be LGPL instead/as well a GPL.

miko
(IANAL)