[ros-dev] Pissoff hotlix

[Quandary]

I'll take the opportunity to kill two birds with one
stone on this one.

On Mon, Jun 27, 2005 at 08:25:49PM +0200, Oliver
Schneider wrote:
> > Quandary wrote:
> > 
> > > 2.c says that an *appropriate* copyright notice
> > > must be displayed. It does not define what
> > > appropriate means. It does *not* say, anywhere, 
> > > that the copyright notice cannot be modified.
> > 
> > we as the copyright holders decide what's
> > appropriate

See below...

> 
> Not only this. I believe that the meaning of this
> paragraph *implies* that the copyright information
> cannot be removed or replaced by anyone except the
> copyright holder(s). And if you come and add some
> code that you can add you copyright *without*
> removing other's copyright(s). But I am not a lawyer
> :o)
>

And that's my point exactly -- you'd need a lawyer to
interpret that, and ultimately it's the judge who
makes the final decision as to what the "real"
interpretation or meaning is (at least it's that way
in the US). The more legal precidence and explicit
laws you can find to support an interpretation, the
better chance you can convince a judge to take your
point of view. Really, the lawyers job is to give you
a best guess as to what he thinks he can convince that
judge of -- but I for one lack the experience required
to make such a guesstimate ;).

In any case, the basic premise still holds: until we
can *prove* (or have a high chance of convincing a
juge) that the copyright change isn't appropriate, it
should be considered appropriate by default.
Defaulting to saying it's inappropriate means that we
could implicitly terminate any of these licenses even
on suspicion (i.e., guilty until proven innocent), and
that just doesn't make sense.


-- Travis

Always err on the side of caution


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