🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <7716@ubc-cs.UUCP> manis@cs.ubc.ca (Vincent Manis) writes:

|   Surely the assignment of rights does not require something of value to
|   be exchanged. Can I go into my local library, take a look at the
|   contents and then publish them as my own?
---
What possible connection is there between the first sentence and the second?
---
|   My understanding of copyright, at least under the Berne Convention, is
|   that the author retains all rights to the work, save those s/he
|   *explicitly* relinquishes.
---
Yes, but there are reasonable questions about what rights you have to begin
with with respect to a particular possible infringer.  If, for instance, I
quote this posting (as I have) am I infringing your rights or making fair
use of them in responding?
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|   The GPL simply consists of a set of conditions under which the author
|   permits the software to be used. This constitutes a declaration that
|   certain rights which the author retains by default can be transferred to
|   other people, provided that other conditions are met. Any copyright
|   notice which states that a book's contents may not be entered into an
|   information retrieval system represents exactly the same sort of
|   situation. The fact that you picked up a book off the sidewalk doesn't
|   release you from the copyright restrictions. 
---
I don't think anyone would claim that she has the right to redistribute the
GNU cource code, as source code, without their permission or the
permission granted by the GPL.  However, the question of header files,
which are NOT redistributed as source files but are used to determine
the object representation of a user's source file, I think the legal
issues are totally unresolved.

Imagine, for a moment, that I write something; my own words, undeniably
my right to redistribute.  Now suppose I transform them in some
arbitrary way.  I believe the copyright law definition of a derivative
work would still protect my right to the result.

Now suppose I transform my words by applying to them a mathematical
function of the text of some other book, the function so chosen that I
can recover my original text (but not the text of the other book) by
applying another function based on that same text (the "one-time pad"
approach to encrypting text).  Soes the result text infringe the
copyright on the other book?  I suspect it doesn't, but I'd be
interested in a legal opinion.

I believe compiling a program using copyrighted header files would be
analogous.  The resulting object program does not contain the copyrighted
representation and the copyrighted material cannot be retrieved from the
object program, but I think that a claim that it is a derivative
work be the basis for a good fight.
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|   Copyright isn't a contract. A licence is not a contract.
---
I think you'd have a little trouble selling that statement to a lawyer.

My own opinion is that it is every bit as unethical for the FSF to hoard
its rights for political reasons as it would be for money, BUT that
civility demands that one respect their intent regardless, whether they
got the legal quibbles right or not.  Nobody is forcing you to use their
product, so use it under the conditions they set or don't use it.
--
scott preece
motorola/mcd urbana design center	1101 e. university, urbana, il   61801
uucp:	uunet!uiucuxc!udc!preece,	 arpa:	preece@urbana.mcd.mot.com