Re: licensing

On Sat, 2003-10-18 at 22:58, Mahesh T. Pai wrote:
> Simon deWeerdt said on Sat, Oct 18, 2003 at 07:16:49PM -0700,:
> 
>  > People wishing to extend it in the purely public domain may extend it
>  > under the GPL, others may establish businesses and use the code via
> 
> PUBLIC DOMAIN  means FREE  OF ALL  COPYRIGHT. You can  take a  work in
> public domain use it in a proprietary work. GPL does not permit that. 
> 
> GPL  in  fact   relies  on  copyright  to  *ensure*   access  to,  and
> modifiability of source code.
> 
> Public domain cannot give that assurance.

Thank-you for the distinction regarding public domain licenses.  I meant
to use the term public domain to indicate that the software was intended
to be kept out of private domain, proprietary applications.  The way I
wrote it was confusing and I appreciate you helping to point out the
difference between Public Domain and GPL.

Both GPL and BSD do assert copyright.  To my mind GPL enforces or
ensures the software remains in the public domain, where public domain
is not a license but simply "other than proprietary" software.  GPL may
allow proprietary interest by the copyright holder but restricts it from
any subsequent use by proprietary interests except with the separate and
express consent of the license holder.  That is, if I understand things
correctly.

If one wishes to assert that the software not be enhanced for
proprietary gain by other than the license owner or its chosen partners
then GPL is the way.  If you are not adverse to it being used as part of
someone's business solution BSD is the way.  If you want both groups of
users/developers to benefit, offer both licenses.  That's how I see it,
though I'm not a lawyer and have deliberately avoided understanding all
the intricacies of these licenses. YMMV

Simon