EULA and Modifed BSD

Chris Travers chris.travers at gmail.com
Fri Dec 14 16:22:31 UTC 2007


On Dec 14, 2007 12:42 AM, Matthew Flaschen <matthew.flaschen at gatech.edu>
wrote:

> David Woolley wrote:
> > Matthew Flaschen wrote:
> >
> >> Just saying you have a EULA means absolutely nothing.  We would need to
> >> read the EULA to make any meaningful claim about it.  It could say,
> >> "Besides the normal BSD rights, if you distribute the program, COMPANY
> >> will give you $10,000!"  That's still a EULA, but it's also
> >> OSD-compliant.
> >
> > If you re-distribute, you are not acting as an end user, so the licence
> > is not an end user licence, even if it labelled "EULA".
>
> Ideally, but in practice the word EULA has been used to describe almost
> every kind of software license.  The OP said his EULA will, "disclaim
> certain exceptional aspects of our software."  That sounds like a
> disclaimer of warranty for use, which would be part of a traditional EULA.


IANAL, but I think you have to be careful with that.  There was a case
involving Adobe a few years ago relating to the applicability of a EULA to
distribution of software.  Basically the EULA prevented unbundling, but the
guy who did it never installed the software, so he never agreed to the
EULA.  Hence the court found that he was not bound by it.  EULA's may
include lots of things, but as long as they are agreed upon through
installation they cannot be assume to bind distribution where the software
would not be installed first.


Best Wishes,
Chris Travers
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