Archive of UserLand's first discussion group, started October 5, 1998.
Re: pd in strict legal sense
Author: Eric Kidd Posted: 9/10/2000; 4:47:13 PM Topic: Guido and Richard Msg #: 21150 (In response to 21139) Prev/Next: 21149 / 21151
For the record, I am not a lawyer. Nor do I play one on discuss.userland.com. ;-)That's a great question. I meant the strict legal sense of no copyright. But I'm quite interested in the difference between the strict and practical senses, and this bears upon my license design.
Yes. I've been told that "public domain" literally means "no copyright". Apparently, the following text makes very little sense to a good copyright lawyer:
Copyright 2000 Sam Smith This code is in the public domain.So the only way to get code that cannot be copyrighted is to have some copyright present, with license terms that aim to do nothing except enforce this situation.
Even with a pre-existing license, you can often add a copyright to a pre-existing work. Is this a problem for you?
Legal Liability
There's another thing to worry about, though: lawsuits. The case law for software liability is extremely murky, and nobody really knows how to disclaim all warranties on a piece of software. There are no fewer than four conflicting legal theories, and the courts aren't saying anything.
Here are some conflicting legal theories:
- Some lawyers say you can't be held liable by people who didn't give you money.
- Other lawyers say that public domain works require explicit disclaimers.
- A third group of lawyers says that your disclaimers are useless unless you put a copyright on your work.
- A fourth group of laywers say that you can't base disclaimers on copyright law, and that you must establish a legally binding contract with each of your users.
Completing the Circle
Getting back to the top of this thread, the debate between CNRI and RMS has a lot to do with this disagreement. The lawyers at CNRI appear to belong to the fourth group, and want to create a legally binding contract with every user of Python. RMS's legal advisors, on the other hand, appear to belong to the third group.
So even though the lawyers are arguing over choice of forum, they're also building their licenses from two different branches of law. This tends to muddy the discussion considerably.
Oh, and one more time: I am not a lawyer. Do not take my postings as legal advice. ;-)
Cheers,
Eric
There are responses to this message:
- Re: pd in strict legal sense, William Crim, 9/10/2000; 4:52:30 PM
- Re: disclaiming warranties, David McCusker, 9/10/2000; 6:20:17 PM
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