OSD compliant shareware

[Humphreys, Noel]

David Johnson wrote:
>In the case of the GPL, and most other OSS licenses, I >>can completely ignore the license, place a full page ad >in the NYT saying "I Disagree", get an official judicial >decree that I have not agreed, and STILL be able to use >the software under the terms of copyright law.

David, you're saying that, fundamentally, open-source licensing simply doesn't work under US law.  I don't understand why you think that you can get a judge to declare that you may simply disregard the license.  Would you please explain why you think that?  How did you reach a conclusion like that?  

Noel


-----Original Message-----
From: David Johnson [mailto:david at usermode.org]
Sent: Thursday, November 15, 2001 9:50 PM
To: John Cowan
Cc: license-discuss at opensource.org
Subject: Re: OSD compliant shareware


On Thursday 15 November 2001 07:15 am, John Cowan wrote:

> > Just because some license declares that I have agreed to it does
> > not make it so.
>
> In the case of the GPL, it says "If you agree to these rules, you may do
> these things.  If you don't agree, you are not bound, but you can't do
> them anyway (because of the copyright law)."

In the case of the GPL, and most other OSS licenses, I can completely ignore 
the license, place a full page ad in the NYT saying "I Disagree", get an 
official judicial decree that I have not agreed, and STILL be able to use the 
software under the terms of copyright law.

Compare this to the typical proprietary license that unilaterally imposes 
terms of use that remove rights granted to the user by law.

-- 
David Johnson
___________________
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