Re: Regarding threats to "CoC" you. - You do have recourse - license rescission

From: informator
Date: Mon May 13 2019 - 00:50:36 EST

I'm not seeking remuneration for the information, nor suggesting any specific attorney, nor will I profit from this is any way. Many of the programmers are completely unaware of their rights regarding their works of authorship and the FSF, SFLC and whomever else have been spreading misleading information. They deserve to know the truth so their works are not, effectively, converted, while they are cast aside.

As a BSD-grrl you probably have ample experience with such misleading statements from said outlets in the past, again and again and again and again.

As for whatever the webhost DNS string means: I don't keep up with social media.

On 2019-05-09 21:10, Randi Harper wrote:
Hm.

You know, as a lawyer, it might be wise to not send people unsolicited
legal advice. Most lawyers tend to shy away from that. But what do I
know, I'm sure any email service that is associated with
cryptocurrency and was named after an SVU episode where women
developers were sexually assaulted by gamers is totally on the up and
up. 100% legit. Thank you, sir, for this valuable service you have
provided to the community. I applaud you and your bravery at ignoring
common wisdom and legal convention. You have done us all a great
service today.

-- randi

On Thu, May 9, 2019 at 8:25 AM <informator@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Dear Poul-Henning "UNIX guru at large" Kamp;
Many have noticed threats made against you recently to seek your
ejectment from the FreeBSD project as retaliation for statements
you made protesting the ceaseless and ever on-going slaughter of
innocents; A transparent attempt to censor your political speech,
if there ever was one.

I am forwarding this message below to you because if such is
attempted, you do have recourse: and that is the rescind the
gratis license you have granted regarding the use of your works of
authorship. You may rescind these grantsfrom your attackers, those
who fail to defend your right to free speech, from the project
itself, or from all free-takers (if such is your wish).

Remeber: A non-exclusive license grant is not a transfer of
copyright, and such a license absent bargained-for consideration
is just that: a license (permission); it is not a contract and does
not
bind the /grantor/ to any terms. It can be revocated at
any time, for any or no reason.

This applies to all the "classic" free licenses, from the MIT
license, to the BSD license, to the GPL.

-------
The proclamations made by some as to the irrevocability of freely
given
non-exclusive licenses are incorrect.

If the non-exclusive licensee did not pay the copyright holder
consideration for receipt of the permissions given regarding the
copyrighted work, the copyright holder can freely rescind those
permissions _AT_ANY_TIME_ .

The reasons are as follows: For the licensee to "hold" the licensor
to
any promise regarding when and how rescission is to take place there

must be a contract between the two. A contract requires valid
bargained-for consideration. Otherwise any "promise" made is an
Illusory
Promise (unenforceable).

"Nothing" is not valid consideration.

Obeying a pre-existing duty is not valid consideration.

The licensee has a pre-existing duty to obey copyright law, without
permission from the copyright holder he may not

use/modify/make-derivative-works-of/distribute/distribute-derivative-works-of.

That permission is what he is attempting to "contract" for. Saying
one
will follow those permissions is not valid consideration to "pay"
for
those permissions. Promising not to violate the copyright holder's
rights -by promising to only use the copyrighted works as freely
permitted by the copyright holder, is not valid consideration as
that is
a pre-existing duty.

Yes: you _C_A_N_ revoke GPL/BSD/MIT/etc permissions from free-takers
at
your will. And you should do so if that is needed for your
livelihood to
succeed.

You should do so if it is simply your want.
(And you should do so if you are attacked by those free-takers)

Do not the pennyless leaches intimidate you from making your own
decisions regarding your work of authorship. They gave you nothing,
you
asked for nothing, they have nothing. Remember: a non-exclusive
license
is not a transfer, it is permission. Permission that can be ended at
any
time unless there exists an attached interest (ie: the other side
payed
you for a license contract)
Also Remember: The FSF has _always_ (and still does) required
Copyright
Transfers before it would accept a contribution.

And yes: I am a lawyer.

Of course: consult your local copyright attorney. Strategy is
important
in these cases. The free-loaders feel they have the 9th circuit
judges
in the bag, and that the 9th circuit will invalidate the concept of
consideration if needed to protect the California tech industry (so
revoke from those outside the 9th circuit first).

For easy to read by lay-people discussions on this topic:
lkml.org/lkml/2019/5/4/334 [1]
lkml.org/lkml/2019/5/3/698 [2]

For legal articles and treatises that agree: no consideration from
GPL
free-taker, no contract, revocable by the copyright holder:
scholarship.law.duke.edu/faculty_scholarship/1857/ [3]

www.amazon.com/Open-Source-Licensing-Software-Intellectual/dp/0131487876
[4]
papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=243237 [5]

Sincerely;
Pro-Bono Attorney

(Note: all discussion herein is in relevance to US law)
_______________________________________________
freebsd-chat@xxxxxxxxxxx mailing list
https://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-chat
To unsubscribe, send any mail to
"freebsd-chat-unsubscribe@xxxxxxxxxxx"


Links:
------
[1] http://lkml.org/lkml/2019/5/4/334
[2] http://lkml.org/lkml/2019/5/3/698
[3] http://scholarship.law.duke.edu/faculty_scholarship/1857/
[4]
http://www.amazon.com/Open-Source-Licensing-Software-Intellectual/dp/0131487876
[5] http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=243237