Re: [tdf-discuss] Copyright Assignments & the Document Foundation

[Roberto Resoli <roberto.resoli@gmail.com>]

2010/11/1 Giuseppe Castagno <giuseppe.castagno@acca-esse.eu>:
> Charles-H. Schulz wrote:
>>
>> Hello BRM,
>>
>>
>> Le Thu, 28 Oct 2010 07:12:59 -0700 (PDT),
>> BRM <bm_witness@yahoo.com> a écrit :
>>
>>> ----- Original Message ----
>>>
>>>> From: Charles-H. Schulz <charles.schulz@documentfoundation.org>
>>>> 4) the notion that we cannot change license  because we don't have
>>>> copyright assignment needs to be put to rest once and  for all
>>>> today. There is a very simple explanation with respect to this
>
> [big snip]
>
>>> Perhaps the way around that is to require those contributing TDF to
>>> use the "or later" language; though some may not want to.
>>>
>>> Even without copyright assignment the only thing standing in the way
>>> of changing the license - whether to LGPLv4 or even GPLv3 or whatever
>>> else - is getting the permission of _all_ the copyright holders.
>>
>> Good objection indeed! Actually, the problem is partly solved, since we
>> now license our software under "LGPL v3 or later". At least it would be
>> solved for the LGPL side of things. But my real answer here though, is
>> perhaps more provocative: if Oracle changes the licence, do we really
>> care? for the 3.3 we stick to the codebase of OOo, but I'm unsure we'll
>> stick that much  to it in further releases. In fact, I can already
>> point out, looking at our development activity, that we're not taking
>> the path of being "OpenOffice.org, just recompiled by the community". I
>> think as the time will go by, we will diverge more and more and end up
>> becoming quite different software.
>>>
>>> >From what I understand this is already impossible to do under Linux
>>>>
>>>> due to
>>>
>>> deaths of at least one contributor.
>>
>> Yes, and in this case a rewrite is needed.
>
> this can work in practice for small addendum, but what about bigger one?
>
> That may take some time.
>
> I implemented PDF/A-1a in OOo around 3 years ago
> (http://blogs.sun.com/GullFOSS/entry/news_in_pdfexport), rewriting it
> from scratch would not be a quick matter.
>
> And, my personal opinion only, years back I signed the then Sun (J)CA, I
> will sign a TDF one or similar without problem.
>
> May be the CA should be on a voluntary basis.
>
> Just my 0,02 as a dev, and not a lawyer.

I can only add an example: Mozilla relicensing took "four and a half
years, 445 contributors and 28522 files":

http://weblogs.mozillazine.org/gerv/archives/2006/03/relicensing_complete.html

And i think that OOo/LibO is one order magnitude (10 times) than
Mozilla in terms of lines of code.

bye,
rob

>
> beppec56

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