Re: Fwd: That whole "Linux stealing our code" thing

[Igor Sobrado]

On Sun, 2 Sep 2007, Alan Cox wrote:
> You can shout this all you like but you would be wrong. You can remove
> the licence if you have permission to do so. For the ath c files there
> was permission to do so.

There was permission to do so from Reyk Floeter?  Really?

> Your understanding isn't quite right. One of many things you may get with
> dual licensed code is the right to pick a licence from several choices,
> you may also get the right to remove some choices from the recipient.

Reyk code was never dual licensed!  His code is under truly free 
licensing terms (BSD).

> A work that combines GPL and BSD licensed material is not the same as a
> work which says I may choose between two licences. If both licences must
> always apply (which is a perfectly possible condition to put in a
> licence) then putting such a "both" GPL/BSD licence piece of code into
> OpenBSD would require any OpenBSD distributed containing it was GPL
> licenced when conveyed, which I am *very* sure is not the intent.
>
> Thus what you appear to be doing by putting the ath5k C code in OpenBSD is
> conveying it under the BSD licence (making a choice between the two
> offered) and conveying a right for parties down the chain to convey it
> under one of the licences only.

I think that Theo explained this point clearly quite a few times in the 
last days.

> And as we've already established the header files are quite different.

Is a simple change in the header files a reason to vindicate the people 
that changed the licensing terms?  Obviously, it isn't.

> Doesn't mean its not somewhat rude but illegal and rude are two very
> different things.

No, because this change is both rude and illegal.

Igor
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