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Nick Mailer nickm at cream.org
Fri Jan 25 16:00:22 UTC 2002


On Fri, Jan 25, 2002 at 04:40:18PM +0100, Joerg Schilling wrote:
> >From nickm at cream.org Fri Jan 25 16:18:59 2002
> 
> >> While it _is_ possible to stop them to distribute the modified version 
> >> in binary form, it is not possible to force them to undisclose their
> >> part of the source. So GPL gives no special help to enforce the freedom
> >> of the sources.
> >> 
> 
> >Oh sure, they can hang on to their "modifications" - let us say they
> >changed a line from 
> >int fish = 1;
> >to
> >long fish = 1;
> 
> >They would be able to "keep" the line "long fish = 1;" and that's it.
> >They'd have to agree not to use any of your code. So, what's the point
> >in keeping these "modifications" if they have no right to the thing it
> >modifies? :-)
> 
> Which brings us back to german Copyright or better "Authorship Right"
> basic and shows that you cannot enforce the arrangements from GPL itself.
> 

What "arrangements"? Please define your terms here. I simply can see
no desireable outcome for this company other than expense and
prohibition. You seem to agree with them that they've found some sort
of clever loophole, and yet you fail to demonstrate the practical
utility of this loophole!



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