mason@tmsoft.UUCP (02/23/87)
Keywords:
I've lost the original of all this but I believe it was Dave Taylor said:
I want to write a new news & make it public domain.
Laudable. I agree the news should be GUARANTEED freely available, but
public domain means that someone could legally start selling it to the
unknowing. So I suggest a copyright by EVERYONE who's worked on the news
software should be included, along the lines of:
(c) Copyright 1981, Jane Doe
(c) Copyright 1982, Jack Duff
...
(c) Copyright 1986, John Gilmore
(c) Copyright 1986, Dave Taylor
(c) Copyright 1986, Rick Adams
To market, sell, etc. this or any derivative work requires
written permission of all the copyright holders. All other uses
are expressly permitted. (Obviously a lawyer (or someone who can think clearly)
should write this more carefully)
Now 2 points:
1) There is no chance that all 20? 40? 60? people who worked on this over
the years are all going to agree to give permission. This would discourage
most. But, you ask what if 35 out of 40 agree? Well, then the would-be
entepreneur only has to:
2) Go through all the code & remove anything that the non-signers worked on,
and rewrite equivalent code.
There is no way that it would be worth anyone's while - simpler to write
a proprietary news program and try to sell it.
I think this is the closest to the freely available anarchy that you (and I)
want for this (and some other) software. I think Rick has taken the first
step. It is now up to the rest of you to ask him to include your rightful
copyright on the software that you contributed.
--
../Dave Mason, TM Software Associates (Compilers & System Consulting)
..!{utzoo seismo!mnetor utcsri utgpu lsuc}!tmsoft!mason