🚀 go-pugleaf

I'm not a lawyer, but I do find these GPL-is-unenforceable arguments
extremely amusing (much as I found funny Ashton-Tate's argument that it
could copyright a language: how exactly would one place an infinite set
of strings into the Library of Congress).

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? (Imagine: `Bright Lights, Big
City', by Vincent Manis. `Slaves of New York', by Vincent Manis. `The
Shining', by Vincent Manis. `The World According To Garp', by Vincent
Manis. I could retire!)

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. If somebody sends me letters, I can't publish
them, without getting an explicit release. You don't even have to put a
little C in a circle to get that protection. 

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. 

Copyright isn't a contract. A licence is not a contract. Software
licences actually comprise two parts: an assignment of rights of
copyrighted material, and specific statements regarding warranty,
delivery, and the like. That does bring up the validity of the Limited
Warranty attached to the GPL. However, either no contract exists, in
which case FSF is not liable, or a contract does exist (say if you buy a
copy directly from them), in which case the Warranty applies. But none
of this has anything to do with the rights to use the materials. 

--
\    Vincent Manis <manis@cs.ubc.ca>      "There is no law that vulgarity and
 \   Department of Computer Science      literary excellence cannot coexist."
 /\  University of British Columbia                        -- A. Trevor Hodge
/  \ Vancouver, BC, Canada V6T 1W5 (604) 228-2394