gnu@hoptoad.uucp (John Gilmore) (11/11/86)
> From: ccplumb@watnot.UUCP (Colin Plumb) > The GNU system is protected by a copyright stipulation > which explicitly states that you are *NOT* allowed to make money selling GNU > or a derivative work... This is not true. Read the license. There are no provisions that say anything about what you charge for GNU Emacs except that if you distribute binaries, you must make the source available for only a copying charge BEYOND WHAT YOU CHARGE FOR THE BINARIES. I have specifically talked to Richard about this, and it's true. If you want to sell GNU Emacs for $5000 to people too dumb to buy it from the Free Software Foundation, you're welcome to, according to the license. In fact, you can sell it for $100 which undercuts what the FSF charges for distribution, if you want. What Richard really cares about is that everyone who gets it (at any price) gets the source and the right to give it away. Richard is not out to end the making of profit, he's out to end the hoarding of software. > From: mjwingrove@wateng.UUCP (Mike Wingrove) > > "The copyright would still be valid > even on a piece of freely distibutable software." ... > This means that if someone wants to copy a PD program, unless it contains > a notice saying that anyone can copy it, then, theoretically, it would still > be necessary to get the author's permission. ... > Another way of stating this is that as well as a copyright notice, PD software > should list the allowable terms of distribution, in addition to a copyright > notice. Otherwise nobody is really alowed to copy/distribute it legally. The above message mixes up copyrighted software and public domain software. The two are MUTUALLY EXCLUSIVE, that means it can only be one or the other. Copyrighted software is OWNED by somebody. Public domain software is owned by the public (i.e. Nobody). Somebody who OWNS a program can allow people to copy it for free and can control the circumstances under which this permission is given. If the program is owned by the public (PD) then there are NO restrictions. PD software does not require anybody's permission. How To Tell The Difference: ==> Is there a copyright notice in the software? No. ==> Is there a notice that says it is "public domain"? Yes: It is public domain software. No: ==> Has the software been publicly distributed (published)? Yes: it is effectively public domain. When the author wrote it, s/he owned a copyright on it even though no copyright notice was in it, but the act of "publishing" it without such a notice basically renders their copyright unenforceable. They still technically own it, but nobody can be expected to know that, since they didn't claim ownership, so the courts rule that they have made it public domain. No: It is privately owned. Recent US copyright law makes things copyright even if there is no notice in them, as long as they have been kept private and not published. Yes: The presence of a copyright notice in a piece of software makes it likely that the software is not public domain, but is owned by someone and controlled by that someone. Now, anyone can insert a copyright notice into anything, so there are ways to challenge this; and a copyright can be "abandoned" by the owner, which explicitly puts the work into the public domain. But in the absence of specific knowledge that the copyright is invalid or abandoned, you must assume the software is somebody's property and can be controlled by them. I'll keep posting this distinction until you-all figure it out. It will be easier on all of us if you figure it out soon. > From: glee@cognos.UUCP (Godfrey Lee) > Message-ID: <263@cognos.UUCP> > > The only long term solution is probably to establish a distributor for > the free software, with the proper spirit (no profit - or as Fred Fish > puts it: low profit), and compete openly. This is what The Public Domain Software Connection was trying to do: become a distributor for the free software, with low profit, competing openly. What they got was a load of flames. (I think $9 for a disk, or $18 for 2 disks, is low profit. If you don't think so, why don't YOU start a business publishing PD software and undercut them? Hmm, not worth your effort, eh?) > From: hull@hao.UUCP (Howard Hull) > > I don't understand the upset. > > I do. I even have a way to make sure that you will, too. I'll just go > through all my USENET tapes until I find something YOU wrote, add a bunch > of really great code, complete with whatever bugs just come naturally, and > then I'll make sure I don't delete YOUR telephone number from it. Of course, > I'll also make sure that it doesn't have mine... I have written a bunch of stuff that I give away. I don't think any of it has my phone number in it. Neither did John Toebes' stuff, as far as I know. It *did* print "Hack version XXX, ported to the Amiga by John Toebes" when you start it up, but he put that in because he wanted people to remember his name. I can't fault the redistributors for leaving it in -- if they took it out he'd scream that he wasn't getting credit for the work! If you want to answer questions from people that get your software, put your contact info into it. If you don't, leave it out. HOW they got your software is not your problem, since you gave it away. If a lot more people end up wanting your help than you expected, well, you made the wrong decision, but it at least shows you that your software has made it to a lot of people, which is presumably what you wanted. This is not a unique problem. If you really want to get somebody, don't stick their phone # into some PD software -- stick it into one of the big lists of BBS systems. I ran a BBS system in 1980 or so and eventually shut it down. I got 5 or 10 calls a day for the next 2 years! > From: net@uwmacc.UUCP (jeff kesselman) > Message-ID: <483@uwmacc.UUCP> > Could we prevail upon someone from FSF to post thier statement, in fill in the > blank form, to save the rest of us the research time of designing one, > and the expense of having a lawyer then double check it...? My offer to mail out copies of the GNU Emacs General Public License and the GNU Manifesto is still good. So far I've only gotten about 5 requests, so it's not worth posting. > I thought just occurred to me. There are a number of national freelance > writer's organizations (as I've mentioned before) that exist primarily to > protect their members from unscrupulous publishers and the like. Wouldn't > it make sense to form such an association of freelance software authors/ > PD software authors either as a seperate organization or as a sub-organization > of one of these? Actually, forming such a guild might not be any more > difficult than creating a new news group. Any thoughts? (1) Creating a new news group is getting tough these days. (2) The GNU project is doing your idea one better. They are working to protect you against commercial software ripoffs -- like $60K for Unix source. It has become worth the computing community's time to rewrite such things in the public domain, because it lets all the little folks see the stuff, run it, and improve it themselves. If you want to help, contact the Free Software Foundation at 1000 Mass Ave, Cambridge, MA 02138, or call +1 617 876 3296, or send mail to rms@prep.ai.mit.edu. IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER: Though my login account is "gnu", I am not offically affiliated with the GNU project or the Free Software Foundation. It really is a coincidence. I have contributed some software and some work to the GNU project but I am not its sponsor or a paid worker for it. -- John Gilmore {sun,ptsfa,lll-crg,ihnp4}!hoptoad!gnu jgilmore@lll-crg.arpa "I can't think of a better way for the War Dept to spend money than to subsidize the education of teenage system hackers by creating the Arpanet."
vanam@pttesac.UUCP (Marnix van Ammers) (11/11/86)
In article <1280@hoptoad.uucp> gnu@hoptoad.uucp (John Gilmore) writes: >> From: ccplumb@watnot.UUCP (Colin Plumb) >> The GNU system is protected by a copyright stipulation Hey, what does "GNU" stand for? There is an awful lot of talk about it without any mention of what it is. I guess I could call or write to that agency you mentioned in your posting, but I don't want to spend the money on the call and the email address didn't look legal for me. I just think it would be nice if whenever someone mentions an acronym (I take it that's what GNU is), and it hasn't been explained in over a month or so, that it be explained again. Not just acronyms, but any relatively new words (zorro is another example). I don't mean a detailed explanation. A single sentence or something in parenthesis would do quite nicely. (zorro is Amiga's expansion specification) Thanks, Marnix ... (<- *not* related to Unix !) -- Marnix A. van\ Ammers Work: (415) 545-8334 Home: (707) 644-9781 CEO: MAVANAMMERS:UNIX {ihnp4|ptsfa}!pttesac!vanam CIS: 70027,70
ccplumb@watnot.UUCP (Colin Plumb) (11/11/86)
In article <329@pttesac.UUCP> vanam@pttesac.UUCP (Marnix van Ammers) writes: >Hey, what does "GNU" stand for? GNU (the 'G' is pronounced) is a recursive acronym meaning GNU's Not Unix (as the other 19 postings responding to this will undoubtedly also tell you. *sigh*) -Colin Plumb Zippy says: (courtesy of M-x yow in GNUemacs) Were these parsnips CORRECTLY MARINATED in TACO SAUCE?