Messages in this thread | | | Date | Thu, 25 Oct 2018 15:39:01 -0400 | From | "Eric S. Raymond" <> | Subject | Re: The linux devs can rescind their license grant. |
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Greg Kroah-Hartman <gregkh@linuxfoundation.org>: > On Thu, Oct 25, 2018 at 07:56:26AM +0000, visionsofalice@redchan.it wrote: > > The linux devs can rescind their license grant. > > No they can not, please do not keep spreading false information.
I think the confusion about whether applying GPL can be rescinded has obscured the most serious actual threat vector.
Under Jacobsen vs. Katzer (535 f 3d 1373 fed cir 2008) authors of GPLed software have a specific right to relief (including injunctive relief) against misappropriation of their software. That ruling (which was the case of first impression on the binding status of the GPL) reputational damage is *specifically* recognized as grounds for relief.
The anti-CoC dissidents don't have to rescind their license grant to cause a great deal of trouble. Instead they can invoke the doctrine established in Jacobsen vs. Katzer, seeking restraining orders. The line of argument is so simple that I could probably brief it myself, and I'm not a lawyer - just somebody who had to become a topic expert in this area to do my job as the founding president of OSI.
For that matter, I don't think the question of whether the GPL can be rescinded is settled - nor does my wife Cathy Raymond, Esq., a practicing attorney who has also studied the relevant law.
Be very skeptical about what the FSF or SFC tells you about this; they have a very strong institutional/ideological incentive to affirm irrevocability regardless of what the law actually says. I, on the other hand, don't have an ideological stake to defend in that argument; I'm telling you that the doctrine forbidding perpetual grants may very well have teeth here. There is, at any rate, significant risk that a court will see it that way.
Between Jacobsen vs. Katzer and the prohibition against perpetual grants I think you are incurring a grave risk by assuming the dissidents have no ammunition.
Better for both sides to climb down from a confrontational position before real damage gets done. -- <a href="http://www.catb.org/~esr/">Eric S. Raymond</a>
My work is funded by the Internet Civil Engineering Institute: https://icei.org Please visit their site and donate: the civilization you save might be your own.
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