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From: drw@culdev1.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.emacs
Subject: The Selling of GNU Emacs
Message-ID: <1764@culdev1.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 19-Nov-87 14:16:03 EST
Article-I.D.: culdev1.1764
Posted: Thu Nov 19 14:16:03 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 21-Nov-87 15:55:53 EST
Organization: Cullinet Software, Westwood, MA, USA
Lines: 47

merlin@hqda-ai.UUCP (David S. Hayes) writes:
| By following the terms of the GNU
| license, instead of the more restrictive vendor's license, the
| users of a product based on a hijacked GNU could effectively
| liberate it.  [...]  I
| think this kind of action is quite defensible, given the terms of
| the GNU license.
| 
|      There is also something to be learned here.

In principle, you can sell someone a copy of something copyrighted
under the condition that he observes conditions more stringent than
what the copyright law requires.  (For instance, the GNU license does
this.)  This sort of provision is generally enforcable in court.  In
the case where you buy something from someone re-selling GNU code, you
get involved in the interaction between the two contracts (GNU &
reseller, reseller & you).  I believe that you can successfully argue
that the reseller had no right to restrict you from redistributing GNU
yourself, by virtue of the licence between FSF and the reseller.  (But
make sure you know exactly what code is covered by the GNU license and
what is not.)

I was talking to a laywer about this sort of thing a few days ago.  It
seems that there is a concept that federal law can preempt contracts
in certain areas.  In particular, if a license forbids a user to, say,
make backup copies (which is permitted by the software copyright law),
the courts may decide that federal law preempts the contract, and will
permit the user to make backup copies anyway.

There was a recent case involving the Louisiana "shrink-wrap" law, in
which the license forbade backup copies, and the court ruled the
shrink-wrap law (and through it, the license) unenforcable in this
instance.  It seems that the courts are much more likely to void
contracts by such arguments when it is clear that the buyer is a
"consumer", and didn't have any genuine opportunity to negotiate with
the buyer.

Also, it seems that shrink-wrap laws are being voided by the courts
right and left.

As always, check with a lawyer first...

Dale
-- 
Dale Worley    Cullinet Software      ARPA: culdev1!drw@eddie.mit.edu
UUCP: ...!seismo!harvard!mit-eddie!culdev1!drw
If you get fed twice a day, how bad can life be?