🚀 go-pugleaf

>From <23167@exodus.Eng.Sun.COM> by chased@rbbb.Eng.Sun.COM (David Chase):

>> Put a copyright on it that allows non-commercial use, but
>> requires anyone wishing to include it or derivitives in commercial software
>> to contact you first.

> I definitely agree with this.  If the code is useful, people will take
> the time to get in touch with you about it.
> I know it works because I've done it.

There are cases where it doesn't work.  People do move, change
addresses, telephone numbers, etc.  and become uncontactable.  I
recently had to give up the idea of using a couple of nice bits of ware
from the sources.misc archives for exactly this reason.

> But, it's your work, and a free country, so you can slap whatever
> copyright you want onto it.

While this is in itself true, there should be some reasonable degree of
freedom in sources that are *posted* to the net, so that the effort
expended by the people who ensure that your sources are a) transmitted
correctly and b) archived does not come to naught just because I can't
can't get at your permission to use the code that you've written.

For *posted* sources (different balance applies to FTP'd stuff) I am always
unhappy to see conditions less liberal than something like:

	"You may freely use this code in a commercial package so long as
	 its inclusion does not raise the price of your package"

so that aggregation with a commercial package is at least allowed.

I guess it's a question of balancing courtesy against rights.
"Balance" is something that seems to stir up religious wars a lot.  Sigh.

-- 
Ronald Khoo <ronald@robobar.co.uk> +44 81 991 1142 (O) +44 71 229 7741 (H)