🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1990Dec16.104300.12930@pegasus.com> richard@pegasus.com (Richard Foulk) writes:

Richard> I understand that anything distributed under a copyright like the GNU
Richard> software can potentially be taken away.  But when it says `Copyright by
Richard> Richard Stallman' I find little reason to worry.  When Peter Deutsch
Richard> says he's serious about going commercial in the future, then I have to
Richard> believe his Ghostscript is a waste of our time.
Richard> ...
Richard> And why is that?  People have apparently been sending Peter fixes and
Richard> sizeable enhancements to help the project along.  But Peter is only one
Richard> person, and since he wants to maintain his ownership of Ghostscript he
Richard> can't accept the work of others as freely as freeware projects normally
Richard> do.  Perhaps his willingness to steal from the net to build his product
Richard> has some bounds.

I make no claims as to any of the following being correct under the laws and
statutes of the United States or any of the indivual states.  I am not an
attorney, so you should consult one for clarification.  This is strictly
personal (non legal) opinion and should be treated as such.

It is my understanding that a copyright gives "exclusive" rights to the
author of a copyrigthed work and any works "derived" from the original.
This would imply to me that any modifications made to Ghostscript by anyone
could be claimed by Peter as his own as he is the copyright owner. It is
also not clear to me that one can waive (or recind a waiver of) rights
granted by a copyright.  I have never been clear on what the implications of
"copyleft" and the GNU General Public License are on what can happen to a
copyrighted (or is that copylefted? :-) work.

Even if I found all of the statutes that govern federal copyright law to
determine exactly what rights are granted a copyright holder I am sure the
legalease would be overwhelming and I would still need to consult an
attorney for a translation into English.

Perhaps someone in the know (i.e. an attorney) could pontificate on the
implications of copy{right,left} and the GPL?  Or are there already such
opinions archived somewhere?









--
Dan Ehrlich - Sr. Systems Programmer - Penn State Computer Science
<ehrlich@cs.psu.edu>/Voice: +1 814 863 1142/FAX: +1 814 865 3176