Re: GPL V3 and Linux - Dead Copyright Holders

[Alan Cox <alan@lxorguk.ukuu.org.uk>]

On Maw, 2006-01-31 at 16:18 -0800, Linus Torvalds wrote:
> That said, I think it actually hass one big result: we may be discussing 
> this for a couple of weeks, but I'm pretty sure we won't be discussing it 
> for months and having a huge split over it in the kernel community. 

Agreed

> Do unto others.. and so on.

This is how you spot a lawyer from a normal human. The human agrees but
the lawyer says "but what about my dentist, will he really want me to
drill his teeth" ;)

> So I'm spending time on this thread trying to make sure that everybody 
> realizes that GPLv2 was always the license of choice - people may still 

The intent is clear by any view for current code, and the past is for
argument but equally its unfixable whatever the result. 

> I was always surprised by how anybody could _possibly_ worry about that 
> one, but it did come up very early. I forget exactly when, but I think 
> that clarification was added way before Linux-1.0.
> 
> In general, people worry too much. 

Its the job of some of them to worry. After all many of them have
shareholders to answer for, and whether they worry about misusing your
pension fund or whether they'll still get a new yacht if there is a
lawsuit, they worry.

I've actually talked to a number of people for whom the syscall
clarification was critical to their choice to produce software for Linux
so don't underestimate your smart planning in advance ;)

Alan