<HTML>
<HEAD>
<TITLE>Re: Viral permissiveness</TITLE>
</HEAD>
<BODY>
<FONT FACE="Calibri, Verdana, Helvetica, Arial"><SPAN STYLE='font-size:11pt'>Well, you can use a permissive license that the FSF deems GPL incompatible for the issue of BSD compatibility, including the old 4-clause BSD.<BR>
<BR>
Of course, it’s by definition not GPL-compatible...or at least according to the FSF. <BR>
<BR>
You could dual license those change blocks as BSD like you can in MPL.<BR>
<BR>
MPL might be the closest in what he wants.<BR>
<BR>
You can use MPL code in your BSD project but that code remains under the MPL license. Neither MPL or BSD claims all your base are belong to us.<BR>
<BR>
Regards,<BR>
<BR>
Nigel<BR>
<BR>
On 1/20/09 2:13 PM, "Ben Tilly" <<a href="btilly@gmail.com">btilly@gmail.com</a>> wrote:<BR>
<BR>
</SPAN></FONT><BLOCKQUOTE><FONT FACE="Calibri, Verdana, Helvetica, Arial"><SPAN STYLE='font-size:11pt'>On Tue, Jan 20, 2009 at 7:00 AM, Steve Thomas<BR>
<<a href="steve.thomas.private@googlemail.com">steve.thomas.private@googlemail.com</a>> wrote:<BR>
[...]<BR>
> Does a license already exist that, for any such chain as in (2), would<BR>
> preclude step (4) whilst allowing (5) and (6) in the event that Mr<BR>
> Takesallsorts chooses to distribute his derivative work ? Is it<BR>
> possible for any such license to be GPL-compatible ?<BR>
<BR>
Almost certainly this is impossible.<BR>
<BR>
Furthermore there is an interesting irony here. Suppose you came up<BR>
with a license that is permissive like the BSD but has a restriction<BR>
preventing its appropriation by GPL advocates. Suppose you have a<BR>
project under this license and wish to borrow some BSD code, which you<BR>
then make changes in. Guess what? If you license your changes under<BR>
your license, then the original BSD project can't accept them back<BR>
without being forced to change their license! No matter how great<BR>
your intentions, from the point of view of a BSD project, your<BR>
anti-GPL license is as bad as the GPL license itself!<BR>
<BR>
It is in the nature of being permissive that you can't accept<BR>
restrictions on code. Any kind of restrictions.<BR>
<BR>
Cheers,<BR>
Ben<BR>
<BR>
</SPAN></FONT></BLOCKQUOTE>
</BODY>
</HTML>