[copyleft-next] [PATCH] (new) Re: Anything that is called copyleft must defend the freedom to install modified versions

Bradley M. Kuhn bkuhn at ebb.org
Sun Aug 5 14:30:34 UTC 2012


Luis Villa wrote at 22:57 (EDT) on Friday:
> That should be "any scripts..." not just "scripts", no?

What is the point of adding 'any'?  Why do you advocate for it, and who
do you advocate on behalf of on this point?

Richard Fontana wrote at 00:03 (EDT) on Saturday:
>> Thanks: suggestion applied but with "any" bracketed.
>> https://gitorious.org/copyleft-next/copyleft-next/commit/df546cda853a72c71abbb6c1db7c3bd07f28b3d8

Why do you believe "any" is correct there?

I've proposed another patch (attached), removing the [any] and bringing
in other parts of my original patch that Fontana removed.  As mentioned
elsewhere in the thread, I suggest that we make this just a
clarification of GPLv2 (sans authorization-keys issue), and I believe
we'll be well on the way to that with the attached patch, which is also
in this merge request:

https://gitorious.org/copyleft-next/copyleft-next/merge_requests/14

> I've never been sure what "control" means in this context. Given that
> "perform" is probably broad enough to completely encompass "control,"
> and given how comprehensive the list of tasks is now (it's arguably
> impossible to "perform" a build without some form of control) I'd be
> inclined to replace "control and perform" with simply "perform," or
> else give a more specific definition of "control" (e.g, by reference
> to configuration files.)

I actually think "scripts used to control compilation and installation
of the executable" is effectively the same as what I wrote in my
original patch, but I've seen weasely lawyers argue otherwise to defend
their GPL-violating clients, so I
think we need as much text in there as possible.  We should keep adding
verbs until we can't think of any more.  The sharks on the other side
will keep coming up with new verbs to tell us they're *so* different, just
to help their client get away with violating the GPL.


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