[Approval request] CMGPL licence

[Marcel van der Boom]

> It means that you created a derivative work of the GPL, something
> you cannot do without permission of the copyright holder.
> 

Granted,...maybe. This is a difficult matter. If I
hired a lawyer and said to him. "I want this license, but in different 
wording and only this article removed" what would be the result of this?
How much wording must be changed?

If I hired the lawyer and drafted in my own words the
rights and obligations of the GPL for him without him knowing the GPL 
(which is very likely sad enough) What would be the result?

I don't know. The software requirements and obligations for creating a 
derivative work are complex enough. I don't know about these legal 
documents like a license. I doesn't feel right somehow to place this 
restriction on it. It *does* feel right to disallow modifications which
carry the same name.


> If you write your own license, not incorporating substantial portions
> of the GPL, then you are copyright-independent of the GPL.  Good luck.

Thanks. This does however illustrate the problem. I want to create a 
license which is basically the same (thus supporting the goal of the 
FSF) but I would be forced to use "proprietary" means. One of the 
virtues of Free software is to minimize redundancy when creating the 
same functionality isn't it?


> Good.

It ultimately comes down to what the copyright holder of the GPL thinks 
of this.

> Granted.  The changes you have introduced, though, probably won't help
> clarify it that much.

That's probably true, but there will be less distraction. The other 
articles are necessary but can most probably be shorter without losing 
their strength. I didn't change them, because I wouldn't know any better 
formulation, partly because english is not my native language, partly 
because I'm not a lawyer.


> I don't follow whether the customers objected to 3c or to the preamble.
> I would think the FSF would be more willing to tolerate a preamble-less
> GPL than one with a substantial article removed, though I may be quite
> wrong.
The customers object to the preamble, and we didn't like 3c because it doesn't 

add anything. It stimulates distribution (albeit non-commercial) without 
source code.


-- 
Marcel van der Boom
HS-Development BV
Kwartiersedijk 14B
Fijnaart, The Netherlands
Tel. : 0168-468822
Fax. : 0168-468823
Email: marcel at hsdev.com



--
license-discuss archive is at http://crynwr.com/cgi-bin/ezmlm-cgi?3