🚀 go-pugleaf

Greg Alexander <galexand@sietch.bloomington.in.us> wrote in message
news:8720im$6nt$1@jetsam.uits.indiana.edu...
> In article <871va3$dm3$1@pyrite.mv.net>, Bill Todd wrote:
> >
> >Graham Murray <graham@barnowl.demon.co.uk> wrote in message
> >news:m2k8kryeac.fsf@barnowl.demon.co.uk...
> >> In gnu.misc.discuss, Stefaan.Eeckels@ecc.lu (Stefaan A Eeckels) writes:
> >>
> >> > All forms of transfer of ownership require an arrangement between
> >> > the two parties.
> >>
> >> But does distribution require transfer of ownership?  Is an employer
> >> not distributing pens, computers, paper etc to employees for them to
> >> be used as part of the employment while still retaining ownership.
> >
> >Not in the GPL sense, since those employees emphatically do *not* have
the
> >right to re-distribute those pens, computers, paper, etc. to their family
> >and friends outside the company.  If you want an intangible example,
> >consider the internal 'distribution' of confidential information for use
by
> >employees in their jobs.
>
> Yes, but GPLed software is, by definition, not a pen, and not confidential
> information!
>
> >The kind of distribution referred to in the GPL pretty clearly implies
> >transfer of ownership.
>
> Not necessarily.  This is something that is probably open to debate and
> needs a good deal more convincing attached than the obviously
> oversimplified statements above.  The GPL would appear to state that no
> distribution may occur if that distribution does not allow the receiver
> to redistribute it.  Pens and company secrets are not licensed under the
> GPL and therefore can be distributed under licenses that do not allow
> redistribution.

Sorry - pens, etc., aren't typically distributed under license at all:  they
are made available for company-related use without transfer of ownership,
just as company-owned software is, and control remains with the owner, who
may recall them at will.  This is clearly *not* distribution in the GPL
sense.

In the case of intangible information made available to employees,
employment agreements often have specific confidentiality provisions, but
only because information is by its nature not recallable (short of lobotomy
or other drastic action).  Software *is* recallable as long as the employee
does not make an unauthorized copy (which would fall under the prohibitions
of most employee agreements covering confidential information, for that
matter), so is more like company-owned pens in that regard:  made available
for specific use without transfer of ownership, rather than distributed for
general use.

The English language is not very precise, and one can pick apart statements,
contort them with unusual but not directly prohibited interpretations of
their individual words, and put them back together to mean something
completely different than the author's intent.  Fortunately, there's plenty
of precedent establishing that such inventive interpretations carry no legal
weight whatsoever as long as the context of the original taken in its
entirety makes its intent clear:  they may be interesting intellectual
exercises, but otherwise they're worthless.

- bill