Re: GPL and NDAs

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Article #23331

#23331

From: Jeffrey B. Siegal
Date: Sat, 15 Jan 2000 00:00

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Bernd Paysan wrote:
> He also concluded that inhouse copys
> are not distributions
> 
> RMS> but transfer outside the company is distribution.

I've heard this interpretatin before but frankly I don't see the basis for
it.  Such copies certainly are copies under copyright law, which requires
permission of the copyright holder.  Otherwise, as you suggest elsewhere, BSA
could not take action against comapnies that copy software "but only within
the company."  And see the Texaco case, which had to do with journal articles
being copied and distributed within a company.  This inside/outside
distinction sounds like nonsense to me.

Now, in the case of GCC, all work has been assigned to FSF, so if RMS says
that copying within a company is allowed without GPL obligations fine, but
what about the Linux kernel, for example, which does not require assignment. 
What right does a company have to violate each contributor's copyright by
non-compliant "internal" copying?

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<y4902dyklq.fsf@mailhost.neuroinformatik.ruhr-uni-bochum.de> <84ga7c$mih$1@nntp3.atl.mindspring.net> <1999Dec30.151712.1@eisner> <386BD144.22362F3A@gmx.de> <o5wvpubn8g.fsf@tofu.to.cygnus.com> <386E890B.1B191CB@gmx.de> <o5iu1bnlr9.fsf@toenail.to.cygnus.com> <3871419C.7D23AE72@gmx.de>

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From: "Jeffrey B. Siegal" <jbs@quiotix.com>
Subject: Re: GPL and NDAs
Date: 2000/01/15
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