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>Also, they can't "unlicense" previously distributed code The United States allows authors (and heirs), except work-for-hires, to clawback copyright transfers
by athms 6y ago
>Also, they can't "unlicense" previously distributed code
The United States allows authors (and heirs), except work-for-hires, to clawback copyright transfers and terminate licenses after 35 years on works made after 1977. This is an inalienable statutory right, which means it cannot be waived even with a contract.
That said, it may be difficult to terminate licenses in practice because open source licensing is done informally in most cases and courts haven't ruled whether this impacts the right of termination. However, copyright assignment and contributor license agreements are subject to termination.
- PeterisP 6y agoOkay, the consequences of this paragraph (https://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap2.html#203 https://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap2.html#203) are potentially devastating if triggered, but 35 years is quite a long time in the tech world. It would be very interesting on how such a fork could proceed once the 35 year term (measured from the grant of that licence, essentially the last day the original open source version was distributed) happens if the copyright owner issues the termination letters, but for all the recent licence switches this won't be an issue until 2050s, and in any case the users would have at least two years of warning to switch to something else or possibly make the product compliant by rewriting whatever of the original 35 year old parts are still needed.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]