Eiffel Forum License

[Mark Wells]

On Sun, 30 Apr 2000, David Johnson wrote:

> That's the way I have always viewed licenses. You have a limited set of
> rights to the copy of the software you own. In order to get additional

If I understand these correctly, the right you have is the right to use
it.  Any other rights (redistribution, modification, public performance,
etc.) have to be granted by the author or other owner of the copyright.

> rights, they must be be granted by the author. Most software licenses,
> free or otherwise, impose conditions along with the permissions, such as
> "you may redistribute this program provided that you also redistribute
> the source code."
> 
> I have a big problem with "license agreements". They state that "by
> using this program you agree to ...". They rarely grant additional
> permissions, but restrict the legal rights to the copy that you already
> have. For example, you have the right to make archival copies of your
> own copies. But many licenses severly restrict this. From what I can
> gather from the wisdom on this list, they only way they can do this is
> by asserting that the license is a contract and that you have legally
> *agreed* to be bound by these restrictions. I still dispute that I have
> entered into an agreement. I already have the right to use the program
> and to make archival copies for my own personal use. By rejecting their
> "agreement", I still have the rights over my copy that copyright gives
> me.

Even if a court were to accept that these licenses are actually contracts,
the procedure for 'agreeing' to the contract is almost certainly invalid.
The full text of the license (for shrinkwrap software) is usually printed
inside the packaging or recorded on the distribution media, where you
have to buy the software and open the box before you can read it.

The logical conclusion of this is that by buying the software you have
agreed to any contract that may happen to be in the package.  I can't
imagine a court upholding this.