Restriction on distribution by Novell?

[Matthew Garrett]

On Wed, Sep 27, 2006 at 04:25:13PM -0400, Matthew Flaschen wrote:

> That's incorrect.  Berne recognizes quotation rights, which are the same 
> thing.  Besides, national laws do recognize it, and thus people can take 
> advantage.  

If you can point me to the section of UK copyright law that allows this 
sort of fair use, I'd be slightly surprised - the relevant law is 
chapter 3 of 
http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts1988/Ukpga_19880048_en_1.htm . The only 
quotation rights apply to criticism or review (section 30) - I don't see 
any way in which a patch could fall into that category.

US fair use law is probably one of the most liberal varients, and UK law 
probably one of the more restrictive. Individual countries may fall 
anywhere in-between. You really can't rely on fair use providing you 
with any useful software-related rights unless you're limiting your 
scope to a small number of countries.

-- 
Matthew Garrett | mjg59 at srcf.ucam.org