FOR APPROVAL - Python License Changes

[Henrik Ingo]

On Thu, May 26, 2011 at 6:17 AM, John Cowan <cowan at mercury.ccil.org> wrote:
> This is a general problem with permissive licenses: if I incorporate
> BSD-licensed code into a more restrictively licensed file by way of
> merger rather than mere aggregation, the terms of the BSD code demand
> that its license be copied with the source even though it is no longer
> the controlling license of the source.  The result is potentially very
> confusing.
>

Case in point, MySQL README file:

http://bazaar.launchpad.net/~mysql/mysql-server/mysql-5.1/view/3061/README

(See lines from 50 to 1288 :-)

Actually, the README was updated with that long list of licenses
during due diligence for the Oracle acquisition. (Which actually
happened after the acquisition, a deal done over a weekend between
Larry and Scott...) Current versions of MySQL apparently have again
omitted the long list of licenses.

I was once answering a Request for Proposals with a question whether
Sun has or owns all the rights in MySQL. I've forgotten what the exact
terminology was (something more obscure than "intellectual property")
but anyway asked our in-house lawyer who told me it basically means we
own all the code in MySQL. So I told her that's not the case and
generally is not the case for any software. She was stunned to hear
this news. I never got an answer to the question beyond that, but
answered "yes" on the RfP :-) It seems that during the Oracle Due
Diligence some lawyer actually realized how MySQL was created over the
years.

Why they later felt those 1200+ lines could be removed from the
README, I don't know.

henrik
-- 
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