On Mon, 14 Feb 2005 21:36:51 +0100, Adrian Bunk <bunk@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Disclaimer:
I did never use BK and I do not plan to use it.
Same here, but just because I'm not a developer ;-)
[...]
I don't know about copyright law in other countries (and the USA have
both a pretty different legal system and a pretty different copyright
law than Germany), but in Germany the clause you mentioned is simply
void according to German copyright law.
German copyright law doesn't distinguish whether you get money for
allowing the usage of the program or not.
The licence is still valid but the clause is void.
I can accept a void licence clause because this doesn't make it
non-void. That's not uncommon. Perhaps 95% of all software licences
contain clauses that are simply void.
In case you ask:
No, there is no case law in Germany - we have a different legal system.
If you like it or not - at least for people in Germany, I see no way how
the law allows you to enforce what you are trying to do.
You can say it might be morally wrong to break this licence clause - but
this doesn't make it illegal.
I think this is true not only in Germany, if I were Larry I would
check if the licence is valid in EU.