[ros-dev] Reset, Reboot, Restart, legal issues and the long road
to 0.3
Reuben Perelman
reub2000 at earthlink.net
Fri Jan 27 02:49:33 CET 2006
Robert Shearman wrote:
> Steven Edwards wrote:
>
>> 4) any developer that had access to leaked sources is baned from
>> contributing code to the project for any of the modules that are the
>> same as leaked sources they examined.
>>
>> So to clarify that, lets say someone saw some of the leaked Windows
>> source code in version.dll, then they would be unable to contribute
>> code to the ReactOS project for that dll.
>>
>>
>
> I don't think this clause is strong enough. I think that any developer
> that saw the leaked source code should be banned from contributing to
> ReactOS. Since there is no record of which parts of the Windows source
> code that these people saw, if any part of ReactOS they contributed is
> coincidentally similar to the Windows source then it could be deemed a
> copyright violation.
>
> If any legal advice the project receives says there is no problem in
> these four cases then this argument becomes less rigid. However, in
> the very least, I would still advocate adding a clause to say that, in
> the future, if anyone was found or admits to have Windows source code
> in their possession then they should be banned from committing.
>
> You can walk very close to the line, but the damages from a potential
> Microsoft lawsuit are so great that it would seem sensible to not go
> anywhere near the line.
>
Just fighting a lawsuit might be more than the ReactOS project can handle.
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