Re: WTF? Re: [PATCH] License cleanup: add SPDX GPL-2.0 license identifier to files with no license

[Christoph Hellwig <hch@infradead.org>]

On Tue, Nov 07, 2017 at 02:15:26PM -0500, Theodore Ts'o wrote:
> On Tue, Nov 07, 2017 at 06:46:58PM +0000, Alan Cox wrote:
> > > Given that it had no license text on it at all, it "defaults" to GPLv2,
> > > so the GPLv2 SPDX identifier was added to it.
> > > 
> > > No copyright was changed, nothing at all happened except we explicitly
> > > list the license of the file, instead of it being "implicit" before.
> > 
> > Well if Christoph owns the copyright (if there is one) and he has stated
> > he believes it is too trivial to copyright then it needs an SPDX tag that
> > indicates the rightsholder has stated it's too trivial to copyright and
> > (by estoppel) revoked any right they might have to pursue a claim.
> 
> If Cristoph has revoked any right to pursue a claim, then he's also
> legally given up the right to complain if, say, Bradley Kuhn starting
> distributing a version with a GPLv3 permission statement --- or if Greg
> K-H adds a GPLv2 SPDX identifier.  :-)


First Christoph really appreciateѕ spelling his name right.

Second Christoph really appreciates talking to him when trying to slap
on licensing bits on his code.  I'm not evil, but I'd really like to
understand what you are doing and why, and I might be fairly agreeable
if that makes sense.

Doing batch annotations of code where you do not the know any of
the history of is a receipt for a desaster if we want to use that
information anywhere.

So Greg, please explain WTF you are trying to do and talk to the
people who wrote the code you are "annotating".