On Sun, Nov 18, 2012 at 11:30 PM, Greg KH <gre...@gentoo.org> wrote: > > Talk to a lawyer if you disagree with this. The area of copyright law, > and software, is very well defined (with one exception of the "major > change to add your copyright, and even then, there's an agreed apon > standard to follow). Because of that, I disagree that you think this is > something that is unknown at all.
I realize that it is illegal to remove a copyright line from a work without permission, just as it is illegal to copy a work in the first place without permission. The question is whether the GPL gives such permission, whether it is possible to give such permission, or at least whether you can give somebody this permission and then sue them for following through. That's my main concern here. Can somebody say, "sure, go ahead and remove my name from the copyright line" and then sue you for doing it? > > But I'm not going to be able to change your mind :) Please get the > Foundation to write up the rules apon which Gentoo developers need to > handle the copyright mark, so that there's no disagreement as to what to > do, in any type of situation. I'm not curious enough that I'd be willing to spend money on this. If somebody wants to change my mind they're welcome to provide me with a reference for a relevant case. I'm sure there are endless cases of bad things happening to people removing copyright lines, just as there are endless cases of people being sued for copying files. I'm concerned with cases where something bad has happened to somebody who removed a copyright line after being given permission to do so, and cases dealing with copyleft licenses and whether they grant this permission. I suspect the wisest course of action for the Foundation will be to take the conservative approach. However, I do not believe that this is because this is legally required. It is simply a matter of not being wise to spend all that donated money fighting to prove that this is the case. After all, even if I'm completely right, that doesn't mean that somebody can't sue me. Winning a legal case in the US is a very expensive proposition. I'm sure that would be the advice of any lawyer we retained. All that said, a formal policy would be a good idea. Rich
