Public domain mistake?

[daniel wallace]

If the GPL is a "bare" license,then what binds the two
mutually disjoint permissions in a distributed
derivative work. How is distribution authorized?

There are two copyright authors in a derivative work,
the "preexisting" authorizing author and "modifying" author.
In a "bare" license or unilateral permission, by
definition the licensor may place no condition on
another's disjoint reward of exclusive rights
(or they wouldn't be "exclusive").

You can authorize a derivative work with a unilateral
permission, but it requires a bilateral grant of
permissions to distribute a derivative work.

The unilateral permission or "bare" license model
of patent law history breaks down under copyright
law because of the two disjoint exclusive
copyrights existing at the same time in a derivative
work. There is no analogous "derivative" patent.

In IBM v. SCO, IBM refers to the GPL as a public
agreement in "binding legal form" because in a
derivative work both copyright permissions of
both authors must be legally secured in a binding
agreement or distribution of a derivative work
infringes one of the author's rights.

When the GPL says:

"You may... copy and distribute such modifications or work
under the terms of Section 1 above, provided that you also
meet all of these conditions:..."

It is not possible to grant permission to "distribute
modifications... provided that you also meet all of these
conditions:..." without placing  conditions on the
exclusive rights of the modifying author and it takes his
legally binding permission to do so..

This result leads to enforcement of the GPL under state
law. This ultimately leads to preemption of the GPL under
sec. 301 because "copyleft" is a new "right against the
world" as cited in ProCD, Inc. v. Zeidenberg, 86 F.3d 1447.

When SCO's Mark Heise said copyright law "preempted" the GPL
and only allowed "one copy" he was being deliberately
misleading. He wasn't referring to the "number of copies",
he was referring to the "number of successors".








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