So you're saying that you have, in fact, NOT working tech support (in the context of the parent, which is clearly 1st tier end user support). I'm sure that you're a very smart person and that you do very important work and that if you died or were fired or not so smart that my lights or power or tv or broadband or phone or something wouldn't work anymore. But you're really, really bad at following the flow of a discussion. You're also not especially knowledgable about browsers, browser technology, or the meaning of the phrase "supported platform".
Whoever is allowing you to download it is the one who has to agree with the GPL (or is the original copyright holder). The "copy" made by your download is created (in the sense of the GPL) by the distributor, not by you. Note that it doesn't have to be downloading, it's distribution - this is much more intuitive if you say "the person handing you the CD".
It certainly wouldn't be placed in the public domain - you could, at any time, start taking steps to enforce that you get your hundred bucks. On the other hand, to get the money from the people who had already downloaded, you'd have to sue them individually, and your negligence in collection would work against you gaining any damages in that case.
And they'd lose, too, because it's both mind-numbingly obvious and very well legally proven that just because you give it away doesn't mean you lose your copyrights on it. See every single binary software download in existence, every painting in an art gallery, everyone handing out pamphlets, and every web page. And a judgment is not limited strictly to damages.
"Aggregation" is when your modules are stored together on the same medium. A storage or distribution medium is exactly what it sounds like - this is not an exception, it's a clarification in response to claims that the GPL does stupid things like make everything on your hard drive GPL. Physical proximity has nothing to do with it - remember that the GPL is a COPYRIGHT license. It cares about distribution of and derivitaves of works. A userland module running Linux doesn't have to be GPL (through some trickery that has potential issues but is tolerated because of it's usefullness, you can have a binary driver module through the use of a GPL stubloader. See nVidia). A firmware loader that boots Linux doesn't need to be GPL (whats a BIOS, then?).
Here's an example - you buy one of the umpty-jillion books that comes with a CD. Say it's a copy of MS Visual Studio, which has a very complicated license. The license for the software on the CD has nothing to do with the lack of license needed for the book, or vice versa. This is despite that fact that the book may be useless without the software and vice versa.
Un-aggregation is not neccesarily a quality of an aggregate.
BSD (and, honestly, any other project) are just as vulnerable - BSD got a clean bill of health a long time ago If you're using 1.4(t?) still, then you're fine.
People choose the GPL over the BSDL generally on philosophical grounds - that's not really something you can argue with someone about. People like to be rewarded for thier work, and most people find alot more satisfaction in the GPL instead of the BSDL.
On the other hand, companies wanting to develop commercial products (obviously) tend toward the BDL. Linux has enough mindshare and marketshare (and, perhaps, enough technical merit. I'm not an OS internals expert, I can't speak for this) for companies to choose it over BSD.
You can impose the specific rights granted to you under copyright law, no others. Not just whatever you feel like. Despite what software EULA authors think.
Such a decision would obviously also apply to people who distibute binaries. For example, you can download full versions of any Oracle product from thier website, do you think a court is going to rule that they no longer have any copyright protection? It could also be easily extended to, say, digital images. And web pages. And any situation where people make copyrighted information available without a prior license.
Just as it's very hard to convince a judge to force-GPL an offending product, it'd be very hard to convince a judge that "You may copy this freely if you obey the following conditions." can be turned into "You may copy this freely." To be perfectly honest, I can't even concieve of a situation where a court case would strip the GPL of it's power - certainly not without stripping every EULA and source license of it's power as well. In a particular instance, the GPL might "lose" because of decisions made about what contitues a derived work, but thats about it.
This is actually the subject of some debate. The official EFF position agrees with you, many other don't - it hinges on what copyright law considers a "derived work" and how substantial the inclusion of header files and linker symbols are. Then theres an issue with static vrs dynamic linking vrs runtime loading. On the other hand, in todays court climate, probably even having heard about the original source makes yours derived.
It's a fine point, but the GPL covers only things that you do not normally have the rights to under copyright law (basically, distribution and distribution of derived works). If you don't want to do these things, then you can ignore/delete/whatever the GPL. If you want to do these things, and you haven't read the GPL, you're violating copyright law. If you HAVE read the GPL, then you're granted a license under it's terms. If you break the terms, your license is revoked (some interpetations of the language revoke your right to ALL GPL code, which would be a good punishment for someone like SCO...) and you're then in violation of copyright law again.
It will be amusing if both cases are in court at the same time, and one set of SCO lawyers are aguing that they lost a billion dollars in buisness due to Linux's success, and another set are arguing that thier UNIX marketshare was so low that they couldn't have caused any real damage to IBMs buisness. And if the evidence is sealed (there's some legal term for that...), then they can't even use the testimony in one case against them in the other!
The VCL re-implements alot of things rather than using native widgets. For example, on a XP machine an easy way to tell a (pre-Delphi 7) app is to look at the minimize/maximize/close buttons, which won't look like the ones on native applications[with the default XP theme, not the "Classic" style]. The VCX (cross platform VCL, for use with Kylix) are actually just wrappers for Qt;)
*pat pat* Your example has nothing to do with either UCITA or EULAs. Thanks for playing, though.
Oh, and if you're doing work for hire, dead beat switches are probably illegal anyway (at least one developer was sued for using one and lost) unless it's spelled out in your work contract (thats the thing that the developer has to pressure the client) that you'll be adding one. For extra credit, read up on how a work contract is different than an EULA and why UCITA provisions wouldn't affect work done under one.
They will certainly attempt to use UCITA to do such a thing, however, much as they use the DMCA to protect things that have nothing to do with copyrights, so it's still a signifigant legal burden on you to get ANY sort of relief. And the courts are not neccesarily known for being sophisticated in this manner - especially if, as is the case under UCITA, the manufacturer gets to pick the court the case is tried in.
More people have computers now:P The parent is actually overstating the case - while these people certainly do exist (I work with a bunch of them, and I'm in IT for gods sake), MOST people do have the ability for rational thought. On the other hand, "Modern" computers don't invite the same kind of thinking that the older ones do, so they anticipate it "just working" and get upset when it doesn't.
An example - a guy I know has used a mainframe terminal for years. He's perfectly comfortable memorizing arcane commands and un-labeled entry boxes and all sorts of other crap. On the other hand, he can't find a shortcut when it's moved on his desktop. He can't differentiate between what he sees on the screen and the back end data. On of the design requirements for our project was that the use of the keyboard should be avoided as much as possible. People just think differently when they see the pretty pictures.
YOU, personally, don't pay nearly full value for any number of services. Everyone, as an aggregate, helps pay for it. Some people recieve greater value from a subsidy than otheres, thats how they work. It's pretty simple.
Okay, but first pay back all the subsidies on phone, electricity and natural gas that made the wiring possible, all the funds for highways and roads, the lowered cost of food because of the reduced transportation costs because of subsidized rail and highways, etc, etc. It's called living in a society. If you don't want to play, go buy your own island somewhere. And, actually, assuming that you are not dying of starvation, disease, exposure, infection, or injury, yes, there are people who need your money MUCH more than you do. Whether they deserve it or not is a philisophical discussion, and not one I'm interested in having because it's basically impossible to change someones beliefs once they form them.
You couldn't even afford the market price for your phone in the city if it wasn't subsidized, so deal. Some things are considered important enough to socialize and/or regulate, and universal communications are one of them.
I saw an amusing Folsoms ad in a mens magazine the other day (FHM, maybe? Dunno. It was lying out at the bookstore). It had a copy of another Folsoms ad that was running in Cosmo, and said you should drink Folsom because they were spending X million dollars to convince women that men who drink Folsoms are smart, desirable men. Made me laugh.
Here's an example: You don't know much about cars. You go to a car lot, and are looking at a Honda Hondinator (model made up because I know jack about cars:P). The salesman tells you that the Hondinator has a v8. You sign a contract for a Hondinator. You go home home, only to discover a v6 under the hood. You've clearly been the victim of fraud, but your contract just says that you're buying a Hondinator.
Things like this are one of the reasons why used car salesmen have such bad reputations. And why people hate vaporware so much.
The other thing people are talking about, in relation to MS, is where your MS sales rep knows you're considering buying another product, but promises you that the MS version will be coming out soon, with full knowledge that it won't. This is another case where you are very clearly being lied to, yet there's no contractual protection - and why should there be? You don't need a contract for this sort of thing. At the same time, you should be able to trust someones description of thier product.
Obnoxiously, in sales, people who can sell this kind of bullcrap are highly prized and known as "closers".
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So you're saying that you have, in fact, NOT working tech support (in the context of the parent, which is clearly 1st tier end user support). I'm sure that you're a very smart person and that you do very important work and that if you died or were fired or not so smart that my lights or power or tv or broadband or phone or something wouldn't work anymore. But you're really, really bad at following the flow of a discussion. You're also not especially knowledgable about browsers, browser technology, or the meaning of the phrase "supported platform".
As another nitpick, the State of Florida actually didn't insist upon getting the source for it's voting machines. Stupid.
Whoever is allowing you to download it is the one who has to agree with the GPL (or is the original copyright holder). The "copy" made by your download is created (in the sense of the GPL) by the distributor, not by you. Note that it doesn't have to be downloading, it's distribution - this is much more intuitive if you say "the person handing you the CD".
It certainly wouldn't be placed in the public domain - you could, at any time, start taking steps to enforce that you get your hundred bucks. On the other hand, to get the money from the people who had already downloaded, you'd have to sue them individually, and your negligence in collection would work against you gaining any damages in that case.
And they'd lose, too, because it's both mind-numbingly obvious and very well legally proven that just because you give it away doesn't mean you lose your copyrights on it. See every single binary software download in existence, every painting in an art gallery, everyone handing out pamphlets, and every web page. And a judgment is not limited strictly to damages.
Here's an example - you buy one of the umpty-jillion books that comes with a CD. Say it's a copy of MS Visual Studio, which has a very complicated license. The license for the software on the CD has nothing to do with the lack of license needed for the book, or vice versa. This is despite that fact that the book may be useless without the software and vice versa.
Un-aggregation is not neccesarily a quality of an aggregate.
People choose the GPL over the BSDL generally on philosophical grounds - that's not really something you can argue with someone about. People like to be rewarded for thier work, and most people find alot more satisfaction in the GPL instead of the BSDL.
On the other hand, companies wanting to develop commercial products (obviously) tend toward the BDL. Linux has enough mindshare and marketshare (and, perhaps, enough technical merit. I'm not an OS internals expert, I can't speak for this) for companies to choose it over BSD.
You can impose the specific rights granted to you under copyright law, no others. Not just whatever you feel like. Despite what software EULA authors think.
Such a decision would obviously also apply to people who distibute binaries. For example, you can download full versions of any Oracle product from thier website, do you think a court is going to rule that they no longer have any copyright protection? It could also be easily extended to, say, digital images. And web pages. And any situation where people make copyrighted information available without a prior license.
Just as it's very hard to convince a judge to force-GPL an offending product, it'd be very hard to convince a judge that "You may copy this freely if you obey the following conditions." can be turned into "You may copy this freely." To be perfectly honest, I can't even concieve of a situation where a court case would strip the GPL of it's power - certainly not without stripping every EULA and source license of it's power as well. In a particular instance, the GPL might "lose" because of decisions made about what contitues a derived work, but thats about it.
This is actually the subject of some debate. The official EFF position agrees with you, many other don't - it hinges on what copyright law considers a "derived work" and how substantial the inclusion of header files and linker symbols are. Then theres an issue with static vrs dynamic linking vrs runtime loading. On the other hand, in todays court climate, probably even having heard about the original source makes yours derived.
Just to make clear what "using" the code means.
It will be amusing if both cases are in court at the same time, and one set of SCO lawyers are aguing that they lost a billion dollars in buisness due to Linux's success, and another set are arguing that thier UNIX marketshare was so low that they couldn't have caused any real damage to IBMs buisness. And if the evidence is sealed (there's some legal term for that...), then they can't even use the testimony in one case against them in the other!
The VCL re-implements alot of things rather than using native widgets. For example, on a XP machine an easy way to tell a (pre-Delphi 7) app is to look at the minimize/maximize/close buttons, which won't look like the ones on native applications[with the default XP theme, not the "Classic" style]. The VCX (cross platform VCL, for use with Kylix) are actually just wrappers for Qt ;)
Oh, and if you're doing work for hire, dead beat switches are probably illegal anyway (at least one developer was sued for using one and lost) unless it's spelled out in your work contract (thats the thing that the developer has to pressure the client) that you'll be adding one. For extra credit, read up on how a work contract is different than an EULA and why UCITA provisions wouldn't affect work done under one.
They will certainly attempt to use UCITA to do such a thing, however, much as they use the DMCA to protect things that have nothing to do with copyrights, so it's still a signifigant legal burden on you to get ANY sort of relief. And the courts are not neccesarily known for being sophisticated in this manner - especially if, as is the case under UCITA, the manufacturer gets to pick the court the case is tried in.
Way to promote proper virus-prevention behavior!
An example - a guy I know has used a mainframe terminal for years. He's perfectly comfortable memorizing arcane commands and un-labeled entry boxes and all sorts of other crap. On the other hand, he can't find a shortcut when it's moved on his desktop. He can't differentiate between what he sees on the screen and the back end data. On of the design requirements for our project was that the use of the keyboard should be avoided as much as possible. People just think differently when they see the pretty pictures.
I use OpenOffice at work, where we've standardized on MS Office, and nobody has even noticed. I'm kinda disappointed :P
If you have file extentsion turned on, this is not true. I'm not sure about if it's off, it's one of the first thing I turn on when I install Windows.
YOU, personally, don't pay nearly full value for any number of services. Everyone, as an aggregate, helps pay for it. Some people recieve greater value from a subsidy than otheres, thats how they work. It's pretty simple.
Okay, but first pay back all the subsidies on phone, electricity and natural gas that made the wiring possible, all the funds for highways and roads, the lowered cost of food because of the reduced transportation costs because of subsidized rail and highways, etc, etc. It's called living in a society. If you don't want to play, go buy your own island somewhere. And, actually, assuming that you are not dying of starvation, disease, exposure, infection, or injury, yes, there are people who need your money MUCH more than you do. Whether they deserve it or not is a philisophical discussion, and not one I'm interested in having because it's basically impossible to change someones beliefs once they form them.
You couldn't even afford the market price for your phone in the city if it wasn't subsidized, so deal. Some things are considered important enough to socialize and/or regulate, and universal communications are one of them.
I saw an amusing Folsoms ad in a mens magazine the other day (FHM, maybe? Dunno. It was lying out at the bookstore). It had a copy of another Folsoms ad that was running in Cosmo, and said you should drink Folsom because they were spending X million dollars to convince women that men who drink Folsoms are smart, desirable men. Made me laugh.
Things like this are one of the reasons why used car salesmen have such bad reputations. And why people hate vaporware so much.
The other thing people are talking about, in relation to MS, is where your MS sales rep knows you're considering buying another product, but promises you that the MS version will be coming out soon, with full knowledge that it won't. This is another case where you are very clearly being lied to, yet there's no contractual protection - and why should there be? You don't need a contract for this sort of thing. At the same time, you should be able to trust someones description of thier product.
Obnoxiously, in sales, people who can sell this kind of bullcrap are highly prized and known as "closers".