GPL and Moral Rights

[Alessandro Rubini]

>> The baviera state (Germany) has been using this "inheritance" to prevent
>> the (re)publication of Hitler's "Mein Kampf". It caused a bit of a stir,
>> because this was the first case of using copyright to systematically
>> prevent the distribution of a book.
> 
> I guess that answers the question then - moral rights could prevent a
> piece of software being published/modified. Sadly, there doesn't appear
> to be anything we could do about it though. 

I think it's different. From what I heard no moral rights are involved
(actually, if any, moral rights of the author is about publishing again
and again).

In this case someone has bought or received by other means the right
to reproduce the work. Then nobody else can reproduce it, and if the
entity who bought doesn't distribute copies, it's all perfect.

There are rumors around about very innovative patents that have been
bought exactly _not_ to industrially implement it, just like a company
can buy a competitor to shut it up.

No moral rights in any of these cases.

/alessandro