[Info-vax] The real problem that needs solving to grow VMS

[Arne Vajhøj]

On 12/16/2022 9:40 AM, Bill Gunshannon wrote:
> On 12/15/22 20:23, Arne Vajhøj wrote:
>> On 12/15/2022 2:39 PM, Bill Gunshannon wrote:
>>> This one really confuses me.  What effect would declaring the GPL to be
>>> invalid actually have?
>>
>> That is a question for a lawyer.
>>
>> But as a non-lawyer I would say that if anyone got some
>> software under GPL license and GPL was declared invalid
>> then that person did not have a valid license for the
>> software and would have to stop using it or risk being
>> charged with copyright infringement.
> 
> I expect the fact that it was made freely available on a very wide scale
> would make that unlikely.
> 
>> And a lot of stuff are under GPL: Linux, MySQL, GCC,
>> WordPress etc..
>>
>>>               Mind you, I have never thought the GPL would
>>> actually stand up in court if it faced a serious challenge.
>>
>> 25 years ago all businesses hated GPL.
>>
>> Today most business love if not GPL then at least GPL software.
>>
>> If it went to court and GPL lost in lower court, then I predict that
>> the GPL defenders could collect a billions dollars to help with the
>> appeal in an hour just by calling all the big IT companies.
> 
> Or the other possibility being that those billions of dollars would
> be applied to arguing that because it was given away with a totally
> bogus license it has actually been released into the public domain.

I am very skeptical about that.

Copyright law and copyright decisions is very far from
a philosophy of "available => legal to use". One need
to have a license. And if someone make a deliberate
choice to make code available under GPL, then it is
obviously their intention to make it available under
GPL not public domain (let us ignore the fact that
public domain has some potential legal issues itself
in the US). Code cannot by magic become available under
other conditions than what the author intended.

Arne