For Approval: BSD License, PostgreSQL Variant

[Alexander Terekhov]

On 10/11/07, Shriramana Sharma <samjnaa at gmail.com> wrote:
> Alexander Terekhov wrote:
> > On 10/11/07, Michael Tiemann <tiemann at opensource.org> wrote:
> > [...]
> >> Licenses like the GPL (versions 2 and 3) are cohort sinks: they permit
> >> others to relicense under their terms
> >
> > Huh? What do you mean by "relicense", Mr. Tiemann?
> >
> > GPLv3:
> >
> > "Sublicensing is not allowed; section 10 makes it unnecessary. ... the
> > recipient automatically receives a license from the original
> > licensors"
>
> I understood Mr Tiemann to mean that you can take code under the BSDL
> and put it under the GPL but not the other way around. The terms
> "sublicense" and "relicense" are synonyms, I presume?

I would have thought that the term "relicense" can be used to label
what Red Hat does to GPL'd software by turning it into pretty
proprietary (copy use "licensed") software... a fee based Freedom
Zero, so to speak.

http://www.redhat.com/f/pdf/partners/subscription_center/RedHat_Subscription_Center_Guide_na.pdf

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No wonder that RMS/FSF doesn't approve Red Hat's distro and urges that
we should all resist and stick to gNewSense and Utoto instead.

I bet that any attorney without a stake in "FOSS law" consultancy
business (so to speak) will tell you that Red Hat is just pretending
to sell support services for free software while actually contracting
expensive proprietary (copy use "licensed") software with some level
of free support.

regards,
alexander.

--
"PJ points out that lawyers seem to have difficulty understanding the
GPL. My main concern with GPLv3 is that - unlike v2 - non-lawyers can't
understand it either."
                          -- Anonymous Groklaw Visitor