5 ms·

GnuTLS, copyright assignment, and GNU project governance

67 points by jmillikin 14y ago

tjr 14y ago
I find Richard's response perfectly reasonable. The work was donated to, copyright-assigned to, and done under the auspices of the FSF / GNU Project for years. Resigning from GNU and forking the project is one thing, but trying to remove the project from GNU is something else altogether.
- DanBC 14y ago
  Reasonable, but dumb. The maintainer will fork the project under a new name, and continue to work for it. GNU will be left with a piece of software that slowly bitrots and becomes outdated, unless it can attract someone else to take it over.
  - yuhong 14y ago
    I think it deserves a new name if it is no longer a GNU project anyway.
    - dalke 14y ago
      Would you care to contribute something beyond what was discussed in the article? Do you also think gnuplot and Gnutella should change their names? Given that Nikos controls the gnutls.org domain, should be obligated to turn control over to gnu? For free, or can he charge them for the transfer?
      - sigzero 14y ago
        Oh...he should charge them all right.
  - joe_the_user 14y ago
    If the project is important enough for free soft in general, they'll find someone. If not, oh well, the cost for waste disposal of bit-rotted software project is rather small, no?
    - DanBC 14y ago
      They had someone, who seemed to be doing a good enough job. Now they have to find someone else to do that job, while competing with a new fork of the code. And the cost of obsolete code is not a bit of web storage; it reflects on the project as a whole. The GNU userland tools have been important for Linux. But what happens if people move to different user land tools? It's not super important, but it is a shame that people leave projects. Perhaps if free software and open source software had invested in a bunch of diplomats to translate the flames between De Raadt, Torvalds, Stallman, etc things would look very different today.
    - dalke 14y ago
      That sounds like a self-fulfilling statement. There are other options than the two you've outlined. What if they find someone to maintain it, who isn't that good? How come the GNU Hurd hasn't yet been disposed of?
jwildeboer 14y ago
Hm. According to european copyright/authorship rules a transfer of copyright is simply impossible as we have the "Droit d'auteur" principle that makes authorship rights inalienable. This is a known major difference between european and US style copyright. Therefore I question the transfer of copyright in this case but IANAL. This simple fact is the reason that FSFE adopted the fiduciary license agreement http://fsfe.org/activities/ftf/fla.en.html http://fsfe.org/activities/ftf/fla.en.html to emulate the FSF approach under european laws.
- adulau 14y ago
  Knowing a bit the background of the FLA, I think that was a just an additional way to convince lawyers to understand the free software licensing model. The patrimonial rights can be transferred in Europe too that's clearly what you do when you make the transfer of copyright in US. As the common ground of the Berne Convention has been ratified by US and Europe, the transfer of copyright (on the patrimonial aspect[1]) is based on a common legal ground. [1] Concerning the "moral rights" in software/computer program, it's usually not legally applicable for software.
  - rbehrends 14y ago
    No, in Europe economic rights are not always transferable, either. The classical example is the German Urheberrechtsgesetz, which does not allow for the transfer of either moral or economic rights [1]. General practice is to grant the publisher a right to use the work (which can be exclusive or non-exclusive, perpetual or time-limited, etc.). This is a subtle, but important distinction. Because such a grant does not entail unlimited rights to relicense the work and the author retains a number of unwaivable rights associated with the work. (German law intentionally aims to protect authors against various exploitative practices by publishers, making it very difficult for authors to sign rights away.) The Berne Convention does not make it necessary for the signatories to allow for such a transfer, either. It only says that if economic rights can be transfered, moral rights remain with the author. Also, moral rights most definitely apply to computer programs in many jurisdictions. [1]http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deutsches_Urheberrecht#.C3.9Cbertragbarkeit_des_Urheberrechts http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deutsches_Urheberrecht#.C3.9Cbe...
btilly 14y ago
Copyright assignment has a major purpose that is not acknowledged in this article. In some jurisdictions (I know that this used to be the case in the state of New York) it is the case that, by default, all software produced by employees who are software developers belongs to the employer, whether or not that software was developed on personal equipment, away from the office. In those jurisdictions it is also the case that many programmers who labor under this oppressive legal regime are entirely unaware that their time is not truly their own. They may therefore contribute to open source projects, and claim licensing on software, that is not truly valid. The FSF copyright assignment process stands as a guarantee that GNU software, at least, will never encounter any issues based on these legal facts. You may use GNU software with assurance that the legal status of that software is very, very clear. What about the rest of us? Well there is a defense for copyright infringement that basically says, "I relied on reasonable assurances that I was not, in fact, infringing." That covers your past infringement. But not necessarily future offenses. But the risk is still low. As a practical matter, companies rarely sue over this type of issue, and if they do, they generally have little interest in suing every innocent bystander who accidentally infringed. So many may find the risk acceptable. But Stallman is an absolutist. He wants absolute guarantees. And copyright assignment helps him get there. Please note that I am not a lawyer and this is not legal advice.
- davidw 14y ago
  It's worth noting that the ASF also requires copyright assignments.
  - DannyBee 14y ago
    No, AFAIK it requires copyright licenses given through a contributor agreement, which are not the same.
    - dalke 14y ago
      I can confirm that it's a Contributor License Agreement: http://www.apache.org/licenses/#clas http://www.apache.org/licenses/#clas > Except for the license granted herein to the Foundation and recipients of software distributed by the Foundation, You reserve all right, title, and interest in and to Your Contributions.
apendleton 14y ago
One particular nitpick: > One of these [scenarios for relicensing GPLed softwar] is relicensing to a later version of the GPL. This scenario is in most cases already covered by the default "or later" language that is usually applied to software licensed under the GPL. That language doesn't actually cover the case in question. The "or later" clause lets the licensee choose which version of the GPL they want, but the FSF's interest in relicensing to a later version is often that it wants to impose the stricter terms of a newer GPL version on licensees. A licensee could avoid the GPLv3 patent restrictions on software licensed "GPLv2 or later," for example, by choosing to stick with the GPLv2.
- cperciva 14y ago
  A licensee could avoid the GPLv3 patent restrictions on software licensed "GPLv2 or later," for example, by choosing to stick with the GPLv2. ... unless he want to use a newer version of the software which RMS has decided should be licensed under the GPLv3 only. FreeBSD has run into this problem with gcc, for example: We could no longer backport bug fixes, but instead had to "clean-room" re-develop them.
  - apendleton 14y ago
    Right, I'm saying that's intentional on the part of the FSF, and an "any later version" clause doesn't let them do that. Obviously, that's not helpful for you, but if that's what they're trying to do, they need to be able to relicense in order to do it, which means either copyright assignment or agreement from the copyright holders.

67 points by jmillikin 14y ago

tjr 14y ago

I find Richard's response perfectly reasonable. The work was donated to, copyright-assigned to, and done under the auspices of the FSF / GNU Project for years. Resigning from GNU and forking the project is one thing, but trying to remove the project from GNU is something else altogether.

DanBC 14y ago
Reasonable, but dumb. The maintainer will fork the project under a new name, and continue to work for it. GNU will be left with a piece of software that slowly bitrots and becomes outdated, unless it can attract someone else to take it over.
- yuhong 14y ago
  I think it deserves a new name if it is no longer a GNU project anyway.
  - dalke 14y ago
    Would you care to contribute something beyond what was discussed in the article? Do you also think gnuplot and Gnutella should change their names? Given that Nikos controls the gnutls.org domain, should be obligated to turn control over to gnu? For free, or can he charge them for the transfer?
    - sigzero 14y ago
      Oh...he should charge them all right.
- joe_the_user 14y ago
  If the project is important enough for free soft in general, they'll find someone. If not, oh well, the cost for waste disposal of bit-rotted software project is rather small, no?
  - DanBC 14y ago
    They had someone, who seemed to be doing a good enough job. Now they have to find someone else to do that job, while competing with a new fork of the code. And the cost of obsolete code is not a bit of web storage; it reflects on the project as a whole. The GNU userland tools have been important for Linux. But what happens if people move to different user land tools? It's not super important, but it is a shame that people leave projects. Perhaps if free software and open source software had invested in a bunch of diplomats to translate the flames between De Raadt, Torvalds, Stallman, etc things would look very different today.
  - dalke 14y ago
    That sounds like a self-fulfilling statement. There are other options than the two you've outlined. What if they find someone to maintain it, who isn't that good? How come the GNU Hurd hasn't yet been disposed of?

jwildeboer 14y ago

Hm. According to european copyright/authorship rules a transfer of copyright is simply impossible as we have the "Droit d'auteur" principle that makes authorship rights inalienable. This is a known major difference between european and US style copyright. Therefore I question the transfer of copyright in this case but IANAL. This simple fact is the reason that FSFE adopted the fiduciary license agreement http://fsfe.org/activities/ftf/fla.en.html http://fsfe.org/activities/ftf/fla.en.html to emulate the FSF approach under european laws.

adulau 14y ago
Knowing a bit the background of the FLA, I think that was a just an additional way to convince lawyers to understand the free software licensing model. The patrimonial rights can be transferred in Europe too that's clearly what you do when you make the transfer of copyright in US. As the common ground of the Berne Convention has been ratified by US and Europe, the transfer of copyright (on the patrimonial aspect[1]) is based on a common legal ground. [1] Concerning the "moral rights" in software/computer program, it's usually not legally applicable for software.
- rbehrends 14y ago
  No, in Europe economic rights are not always transferable, either. The classical example is the German Urheberrechtsgesetz, which does not allow for the transfer of either moral or economic rights [1]. General practice is to grant the publisher a right to use the work (which can be exclusive or non-exclusive, perpetual or time-limited, etc.). This is a subtle, but important distinction. Because such a grant does not entail unlimited rights to relicense the work and the author retains a number of unwaivable rights associated with the work. (German law intentionally aims to protect authors against various exploitative practices by publishers, making it very difficult for authors to sign rights away.) The Berne Convention does not make it necessary for the signatories to allow for such a transfer, either. It only says that if economic rights can be transfered, moral rights remain with the author. Also, moral rights most definitely apply to computer programs in many jurisdictions. [1]http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deutsches_Urheberrecht#.C3.9Cbertragbarkeit_des_Urheberrechts http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deutsches_Urheberrecht#.C3.9Cbe...

btilly 14y ago

Copyright assignment has a major purpose that is not acknowledged in this article. In some jurisdictions (I know that this used to be the case in the state of New York) it is the case that, by default, all software produced by employees who are software developers belongs to the employer, whether or not that software was developed on personal equipment, away from the office. In those jurisdictions it is also the case that many programmers who labor under this oppressive legal regime are entirely unaware that their time is not truly their own. They may therefore contribute to open source projects, and claim licensing on software, that is not truly valid. The FSF copyright assignment process stands as a guarantee that GNU software, at least, will never encounter any issues based on these legal facts. You may use GNU software with assurance that the legal status of that software is very, very clear. What about the rest of us? Well there is a defense for copyright infringement that basically says, "I relied on reasonable assurances that I was not, in fact, infringing." That covers your past infringement. But not necessarily future offenses. But the risk is still low. As a practical matter, companies rarely sue over this type of issue, and if they do, they generally have little interest in suing every innocent bystander who accidentally infringed. So many may find the risk acceptable. But Stallman is an absolutist. He wants absolute guarantees. And copyright assignment helps him get there. Please note that I am not a lawyer and this is not legal advice.

davidw 14y ago
It's worth noting that the ASF also requires copyright assignments.
- DannyBee 14y ago
  No, AFAIK it requires copyright licenses given through a contributor agreement, which are not the same.
  - dalke 14y ago
    I can confirm that it's a Contributor License Agreement: http://www.apache.org/licenses/#clas http://www.apache.org/licenses/#clas > Except for the license granted herein to the Foundation and recipients of software distributed by the Foundation, You reserve all right, title, and interest in and to Your Contributions.

apendleton 14y ago

One particular nitpick: > One of these [scenarios for relicensing GPLed softwar] is relicensing to a later version of the GPL. This scenario is in most cases already covered by the default "or later" language that is usually applied to software licensed under the GPL. That language doesn't actually cover the case in question. The "or later" clause lets the licensee choose which version of the GPL they want, but the FSF's interest in relicensing to a later version is often that it wants to impose the stricter terms of a newer GPL version on licensees. A licensee could avoid the GPLv3 patent restrictions on software licensed "GPLv2 or later," for example, by choosing to stick with the GPLv2.

cperciva 14y ago
A licensee could avoid the GPLv3 patent restrictions on software licensed "GPLv2 or later," for example, by choosing to stick with the GPLv2. ... unless he want to use a newer version of the software which RMS has decided should be licensed under the GPLv3 only. FreeBSD has run into this problem with gcc, for example: We could no longer backport bug fixes, but instead had to "clean-room" re-develop them.
- apendleton 14y ago
  Right, I'm saying that's intentional on the part of the FSF, and an "any later version" clause doesn't let them do that. Obviously, that's not helpful for you, but if that's what they're trying to do, they need to be able to relicense in order to do it, which means either copyright assignment or agreement from the copyright holders.