Licenses etc. (was: Re: [antlr-interest] Re: Antlr Studio iscool.)

[Anthony Youngman]

I said that you can't *sell* my work. You said you can *charge* for my
work. Where's the conflict?

And as for the "definition of derivative", that's not the GPL's problem.
If, LEGALLY, your work is a derivative of a GPL work, then the GPL
applies. Because the GPL is a *licence*, then the meaning of the word
"derivative" is whatever your government says it is, and it's not in the
GPL's interest to try to (re)define it.

As for what happened with the phone call with RMS, I guess Ter said "I
know what the GPL does, and it's not what I want". I can't see RMS
having a problem with that ...

Cheers,
Wol

-----Original Message-----
From: antlr-interest-bounces at antlr.org
[mailto:antlr-interest-bounces at antlr.org] On Behalf Of Paul Johnson
Sent: 23 September 2005 09:30
To: antlr-interest at antlr.org
Subject: Re: Licenses etc. (was: Re: [antlr-interest] Re: Antlr Studio
iscool.)

Anthony Youngman wrote:
> The thing with the GPL is that it does NOT prevent an author selling
his
> own work. If Prashant wants to sell Antlr Studio, that is his moral
> right.
> 
> What the GPL does (and is intended to do) is stop *you* selling *my*
> work (and cutting me out of the loop).

Not quite - you can charge whatever you want for GPL'ed work, whoever 
wrote it. The GPL has nothing to do with money. Two quotes:

> When we speak of free software, we are referring to freedom, not
price.

> You may charge a fee for the physical act of transferring a copy, and
> you may at your option offer warranty protection in exchange for a
> fee.

Note that the second quote refers to any GPL'ed software - not, for 
example, your own work or your derivative of a GPL'ed work. There is no 
definition of what a fee is, and no statement that it should be 
'reasonable'.

The GPL has many problems, not the least of which is the definition of a

'derivative' work. It's not clear at what point you become obliged to 
distribute a copy of your own source code if you include any GPL'ed 
source in your code. That's why real-world commercial organisations 
don't like it. A second issue is that, if you do charge a lot of money 
to distribute your own (or someone else's) work, then there's nothing to

stop a third party also distributing that work for gratis.

IMHO, the GPL is simply a religious manifesto, and is a pile of crock. 
Ter has cut right through this with his own licence, which is a model of

simplicity and clarity. I would love to know what happened in that phone

conversation with Richard Stallman...


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