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On Thursday 20 April 2006 8:49 am, Peter Lloyd-Jones wrote: > As some of you know I have a model railway and I am interested in computer > control . To that end I use JMRI (Java Model Railway Interface). The author could have difficulty because of the licence he has chosen. If he updates the licence from the Artistic Licence to the Clarified Artistic Licence it would make it simpler for others to use the JRMI. http://www.statistica.unimib.it/utenti/dellavedova/software/artistic2.html http://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html#ArtisticLicense A vague licence like the original Artistic Licence currently in use for JRMI is not going to help his cause or yours. Only the author can change the licence and only when he can get agreement to do so from any other contributors. It may still be possible to do that now (if most of JRMI was written by him) and it would provide some protection to those who would use his software in the future. > As a > moderator on that Yahoo list I have been warned by the author to be ready > for a possible storm, which he does not want to spill out into the group. Get in early and settle the issue with some clear, authoritative and concise explanations. As moderator, you can set the rules and denote whether discussion of certain elements of the problem is allowable. > The group: > > http://groups.yahoo.com/group/jmriusers/ If the group exists to support JRMI users, hasn't the issue already been done to death? > we could have nastiness (but pro JMRI) spilling over into our site. > I know that the copyright problem is more of a problem (opps) "over there" > but it could come here. Free Software distribution is inherently global. You cannot restrict the distribution by saying it's only available to people in certain countries. A problem in one country is a problem for all. However, JRMI is actually not free at all. It's one of those open-source but non-free packages. Before you use it and certainly before you get involved in any kind of distribution of it or software that depends on it, try to persuade the author to change the licence to at least the Clarified Artistic Licence. The Modified BSD licence may suit too - it depends on how JRMI is related to Java and Sun's licences. Having said all that, licences aren't the actual problem here - the problem is US patents. A clear licence can help if things get tortuous in court but until GPL3 arrives, there is little that a licence can do to affect patent processes. The patent holder knows it will cost more to defend against the patent(s) than it will to settle out-of-court. Reminded of a discussion (I think) at a FFII event: Company A targets company B with a patent lawsuit, alleging infringement of 7 patents. Company B analyses each individual patent and utterly destroys the case of each one in turn. Company A doesn't bat an eyelid, simply replaces the first 7 with a dozen more. :-( It's bad enough that these patents are granted in the US - it'd be absolute disaster for such patents to become enforceable in the EU / UK. -- Neil Williams ============= http://www.data-freedom.org/ http://www.nosoftwarepatents.com/ http://www.linux.codehelp.co.uk/
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