RE: Down with the GPL!

I think this language makes perfect sense for a closed-source software
company.  At the last 3 software companies I've worked for (1 venture-funded
startup, 2 public companies), it was forbidden to incorporate GPL software
into the product, but we used as much LGPL and Apache code as we could.

-----Original Message-----
From: DV Henkel-Wallace [mailto:[email protected]] 
Sent: Thursday, May 12, 2005 4:47 PM
To: Free Software for Business
Subject: Down with the GPL!

I asked our law firm for their standard employee confidentiality and 
assignment agreement for our company to use.  They are a large, 
well-respected form used by many many startups and big companies.

It contained the following fascinating sentence:

     "I agree that I will not incorporate into any Company software
       or otherwise deliver to Company any software code licensed
       under the GNU GPL or LGPL or any other license that, by its
       terms, requires or conditions the use or distribution of such
       code on the disclosure, licensing, or distribution of any source
       code owned or licensed by Company. "

I had this changed this to say words to the effect  that I (nor any the 
other employee) would not incorporate third-party software that might 
in any way affect our ability to redistribute (or not) any software 
without permission of a company officer.  Note that the latter 
restricts the use of Visual C++, c# etc as well!

I am astonished to find the text in a standard document.

Grr.

-g