[copyleft-next] Limited-term copyleft

Richard Fontana fontana at sharpeleven.org
Sat Feb 16 02:38:55 UTC 2013


On Thu, Feb 14, 2013 at 06:53:51AM +0100, Kuno Woudt wrote:
> On 02/14/2013 04:40 AM, Richard Fontana wrote:
> >Does anyone think the idea of a limited-term copyleft -- particularly
> >given that copyleft-next is a software-oriented license -- is a
> >good/bad idea?
> >
> >We're now a few years from the point where there could be 30-year-old
> >code under GPL-like licenses. I have found from $DAYJOB experience
> >that one occasionally has to deal with legal issues concerning
> >*really* old code (in a situation I dealt with today, from 1979;
> >admittedly that's unusual).
> >
> >The idea would be to have the copyleft terms disappear after some
> >limited period far short of the statutory copyright term.
> 
> The only reason I can see for wanting this is to deal with copyleft
> license compatibility issues.  Which in my experience are not enough
> of a problem to weaken the copyleft nature of the work in this way.

Out of curiosity: If you were writing a new copyright statute to cover
software, how long would you make the duration of copyright?
 
 - RF


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