compatibility and the OSD

Lawrence Rosen lrosen at rosenlaw.com
Mon Sep 20 22:05:47 UTC 2004


> No problem.  An approvable license could say simply "You may
> redistribute this software under the terms of the BSD license unless
> you call yourself Bob Scheifler, in which case you must use the GPL."

Why would that be approvable? Would it be approvable if it said "You may
redistribute this software under the terms of the BSD license unless you
call yourself Russ Nelson, in which case you must use a proprietary
license."

What's the difference? Does it matter conceptually that both licenses are
open source?

/Larry

Lawrence Rosen 
Rosenlaw & Einschlag, technology law offices (www.rosenlaw.com)
3001 King Ranch Road, Ukiah, CA 95482 
707-485-1242 * fax: 707-485-1243 
email: lrosen at rosenlaw.com 



> -----Original Message-----
> From: Russell Nelson [mailto:nelson at crynwr.com]
> Sent: Monday, September 20, 2004 11:20 AM
> To: Bob.Scheifler at Sun.COM
> Cc: license-discuss at opensource.org
> Subject: Re: compatibility and the OSD
> 
> Bob Scheifler writes:
>  > For my personal edification, and hoping this is an acceptable inquiry,
>  > I'd like to understand if and specifically how the following informal
>  > license sketch conflicts with the OSD. Any and all comments
> appreciated.
>  >
>  > 1. The licensed work consists of source code, test suite in executable
>  >     form, and test suite documentation.
>  > 2. A derivative work in executable form that has passed the unmodified
>  >     test suite can be distributed under a license of your choosing.
>  > 3. Any other derivative work can only be distributed under this
> license.
>  >     Any such distribution must include the unmodified test suite and
>  >     test suite documentation.
> 
> No problem.  An approvable license could say simply "You may
> redistribute this software under the terms of the BSD license unless
> you call yourself Bob Scheifler, in which case you must use the GPL."
> 
> --
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