Messages in this thread | | | From | Rory Browne <> | Date | Thu, 17 Jul 2003 22:01:07 +0100 | Subject | Re: BK Licence: Protocols and Research |
| |
I had hoped to bring this discussion to a more private level between myself and Larry McVoy.
I am however disgusted to find that he has shared details, which I explicitly marked as Private, with a third Party, namely One of the Educational institutes I am involved with.
I find this breach of confidence distrubing.
* Larry McVoy <lm@bitmover.com> [030717 15:55]: > With apologies to the list for the off topic post (I'm really trying to > not annoy you guys but some stuff we can't let slide due to legalities). > > On Thu, Jul 17, 2003 at 01:05:05PM +0100, Rory Browne wrote: > > Would the conduction of research(and publication of results of same) on > > the bitkeeper formats/protocols, preclude users from using the Free version > > of Bitkeeper, for the research project? > > Yes, for the research project and/or anything else. > > > Would the carrying out of such research using the free version of > > Bitkeeper, prevent them from developing a product which contains > > substantially similar capabilities of the BitKeeper Software in the > > Future, assuming that all copies of Bitkeeper were destroyed before the > > development started? > > Yes. > > > Would previous activity in the area of developing a product which > > contains substantially similary features to Bitkeeper preclude users from > > using the Free Bitkeeper software? > > Yes. > > Each question above can be restated as "Would it be OK if we used BK > in violation of its license?". The answer is no and if you did that we > would be forced to come after you, if we don't and some large company did > the same thing we would have a much tougher time enforcing the license. > Trademarks and licenses tend to lose their value if you don't enforce > them. > > Your questions indicate one of two things: you either have a burning > desire to work on BK itself or a burning desire to copy BK. If it's > the former, that's easy, send us a resume and if you are a good engineer > we'll hire you, we need good engineers with a solid understanding of file > systems, distributed systems, graphs and sets, and/or human interfaces. > > If you are trying to copy BK, give it up. We'll simply follow in the > footsteps of every other company faced with this sort of thing and change > the protocol every 6 months. Since you would be chasing us you can never > catch up. If you managed to stay close then we'd put digital signatures > into the protocol to prevent your clone from interoperating with BK. > > Instead of trying to copy our work in violation of our license, you'd be > far better served by doing some new work. If you like SCM then either > work here, work on some other SCM unrelated to BK, or expect a costly > discussion with a lawyer. I realize this is an unpopular position but > that's tough, it's our code and our license and you obey the rules > or suffer the consequences. The license is a contract and it's an > enforceable contract, we have gone up against a company who spends more > on lawyers in a week than our annual gross revenues and successfully > enforced it. > -- > --- > Larry McVoy lm at bitmover.com http://www.bitmover.com/lm - To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/
| |