Put it in laymen's terms

bruce at perens.com bruce at perens.com
Sun Aug 1 18:29:48 UTC 1999


From: Seth David Schoen <schoen at loyalty.org>
> The point is that the developers have full authority to do so, whereas
> in other circumstances one can't simply "withdraw" a published GPLed
> contribution.

I've had a few hours to think about this, and I still categorize it as
"legally true - but wouldn't happen".

I agree that Linus could have been more rigorous in his implementation of
the exception, for example he could have required others to place it on their
code before submission.

However, you can also take Linus' note as an interpretation of the scope of the
GPL and not an exception at all. This is what makes me wish the GPL was more
clear or what is derivation and what is fair use of an exported interface.

	Thanks

	Bruce



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