RE: Wasting our Freedom

David Schwartz
2007-09-17T11:58:18Z

> On Sun, Sep 16, 2007 at 03:19:41PM -0700, David Schwartz wrote:
> >[...]
>
> >If you take work that's under a dual-license and remove one
> >license notice
> >from it when you create a derivative work, every recipient of that
> >derivative work still receives a dual license from the original author to
> >every protectable element still in the distributed work.

> But you may *not* remove the license notices on GPL/BSD dual-licensed
> works. *Both* forbid removing the licensing terms.

No, I'm sorry, this is not correct. The GPL gives you the right to remove
the BSD license. Read the GPL and please tell me where it says you must keep
the BSD license notice intact.

> >2) You can remove a BSD license notice from BSD-only code. (The
> >BSD license
> >prohibits this.)

> The BSD license prohibits this anyway, regardless of whether BSD is the
> only license or not (dual-licensing). Heck, copyright law itself forbids
> it unless explicitly allowed.

It doesn't matter that the BSD license prohibits it, its terms only apply to
you if you agree to it. Generally, you agree to it implicitly by doing
something that only the BSD license could give you the right to do, such as
modify or distribute a BSD-only work.

But in the case of a dual-licensed work, you can obtain the right to modify
or distribute it from the GPL. In that case, you can totally ignore anything
the BSD license says. You are under no obligation to comply with it.

As for copyright law prohibiting it, the GPL is quite clear about allowing
it. The GPL permits all modifications except those it specifically restricts
(and none of those rules would prohibit removing a BSD license). In fact,
the GPL specifically prohibits the imposition of "additional restrictions".

Copyright law permits you to impose all kinds of restrictions on what people
can do with your work. However, when you offer a work under the GPL, you
lose any right to insist that the work remain in any particular form or
contain any particular elements, except the GPL itself. The GPL grants
modification rights limited only by the restrictions in the GPL itself.

You cannot use any form of subterfuge to get something into a GPL-compatible
file that I cannot remove, by any means. (Other than the GPL license, of
course.) See GPL section 6.

DS