Re: Announcing the VM/370 and VM/380 "SixPack" version 1.2 release candidate 1!

--- In [email protected], "Rocky" <rocsystems@...> wrote:
>
> Seems to me you are nitpicking for no real reason.

No. Copyright violation is a serious issue. There
are massive fines if you are found guilty. I've
witnessed people making something available for
free download, only to turn around later and
attempt to rescind that. (only a court can decide
for sure whether they are allowed to do that or
not - I think they can't).

> Source control is time consuming  and an additional 
> hassle that I don't really want to deal with.

You don't need to deal with it, even if a snapshot
of your code is distributed.

> I think that would cause more confusion then help.

For the end user, no source, vs source, is less
helpful.

> Be my guest and take it off  my site and change or 
> do as you will with it.

Same as I can do with Shakespeare's "Hamlet"?
That would make it public domain.

> You can freely distribute the source to anybody as 
> long as you tell them
> that its your version and not my version. 

As you add conditions like this, you are creating
a license.

> (if you want to give me some credits I'll appreciate 
> that but it is not required)

Ok, that intent doesn't require a license, but
once you have one, may as well add that.

> More than that I cannot do and I have no idea 
> why you are hasseling me about this.

Requesting a clarification of license, and source
code is hardly "hassling". This was my first request
ever for this, wasn't it? Is asking for a zip file
with source and a version number, with a PD notice
or similar, for the first time ever, considered
hassling? Seems quite strange to me.

> If you make changes and they get put on the SIX-PACK 
> then it's your problem and not mine

Sure, I think that's implied.

> Actually now that you brought up all these silly 
> issues

You can't both consider them to be silly and
then start adding restrictions when you realise
that public domain isn't what you intended after
all.

> – How about figuring out the proper language 

So you want me to write a license for you?
There are heaps of them already available, and
if none of those suit your needs, then it needs
to be customized to your personal desire,
something that only you can do.

Common ones include public domain, BSD, GPL, QPL.
But none of those do what you ask below.

I can certainly help you write a custom one though,
if you can clarify your intentions, especially if
you've had a read of BSD 2-clause license, with
the additional disclaimer dropped, ala NetBSD.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BSD_licenses#2-clause_license_.28.22Simplified_BSD_License.22_or_.22FreeBSD_License.22.29

> to say that if you copy the ideas 

This one is impossible. You need to apply for a
software patent if you want to restrict ideas.

> and sell them as a
> commercial product and make lots of money off of that and become a
> multi-millionaire, (if you are not already one), then you 
> should give me
> some so I can continue to eat.  

Ok, here you are saying it is free for non-commercial use.

For commercial use, the person wishing to use it should
contact you. Because the above language is too unclear.
It seems to be that if a company starts using it, and
in their normal operation (e.g. let's say they are
selling a VM/380+ product), if the company is a sole
trader and the owner has 2 million dollars already,
no payment is required.

But if the company has 10,000 shareholders, and the
wealthiest one has $1.9 million, US, I assume, then
they don't need to pay anything.

But as soon as one person in the company hits $2
million (thus multi-millionaire), they need to send
you a cheque for US$0.01 (part of it), which should
be sufficient to buy one grain of rice in Mozambique,
thus satisfying the "continue to eat" criteria.

Maybe.

Maybe courts will interpret that as a requirement
to provide sufficient calories to you at Israeli
prices.

The fact that questions like that can only be
resolved in court are the big problem.

Personally, if I don't think there's any likelihood
of me personally commercializing the product, I
make it public domain. To me, anything else is a
silly waste of time. But I'm in the minority. Most
people like to add a laundry list of conditions
that provide 0 financial benefit to themselves,
and just make their software unusable for some
projects.

Note that TCP/IP has been available for many years
for MVS 3.8j, but copyright questions kept it held up
until the BSD license was finally selected by the
author. Now it has moved to at least be "in the works".

BFN.  Paul.