On 14/11/2007, Steve Bennett <stevagewp(a)gmail.com> wrote: True but those with an interest in preventing it rarely mention the different between copyright infringement and plagiarism something which tends to result in a certain degree of confusion. -- geni

Good point, I failed to account for "moral rights" or whatever they are called.

Thomas Dalton wrote: It's not a copyright violation; it's a breach of contract. Ec

On 14/11/2007, Ray Saintonge <saintonge(a)telus.net> wrote: You can't breach a contract you never agreed to. If you say you're using it under the license and do so incorrectly, then yes, it's breach of contract, but if you just use it without reference to the license (which is what we're talking about here, as far as I know), then the license doesn't apply and it's copyright violation.

On Nov 14, 2007 1:00 PM, Kwan Ting Chan <ktc(a)ktchan.info> wrote: Which to my understanding says that if you distribute an open source project you have in effect agreed to the license, which is a form of contract, and if you breach the license it is not copyright infringement but breach of contract. This is definitely early days as far as getting legal precedent for open source licensing, but it's interesting. -Matt

Matthew Brown schreef: Note that according to the The Register story, this was about the Artistic License. You cannot generalise this to other open source licenses. Clause 9 of the GFDL says: "You may not copy, modify, sublicense, or distribute the Document except as expressly provided for under this License. Any other attempt to copy, modify, sublicense or distribute the Document is void, and will automatically terminate your rights under this License. [...]" So breaking the contract results in voiding the license agreement, which means that further distribution would be a copyright violation. The Artistic License lacks a similar clause. This difference may well lead a judge to come to different conclusions on both licenses. But [[IANAL]] (IAAP). Eugene

Thomas Dalton wrote: Arguing that you have not read the contract does not absolve you of its terms. With many licences simply availing oneself of their benefits includes an implicit agreement with the terms of the licence. This can be the case with shrinkwraped licences where if you break the seal, you agree to the licence. Ec

On Nov 15, 2007 4:52 AM, Ray Saintonge <saintonge(a)telus.net> wrote: Really? That seems strange. A contract requires a [[meeting of the minds]]. How can you have a meeting of the minds if one of the parties doesn't even know what she's agreed to? You don't have to read every word, but surely one must understand the basic concept of what she's agreeing to in order to have a valid contract. Isn't that why so many contracts make you initial individual key paragraphs? AFAIK that POV has never held up in court. AFAIK the only time something remotely close has held up was when a purchase was made directly from the manufacturer, and no seal was ever broken. The theory was that the contract was formed *at the time of sale*, and not at the time the software was taken out of any shrinkwrap. Whenever I get software with a shrinkwrapped license I always cut the back of the envelope and leave the seal intact. Does this mean I'm less bound by the contract than someone who "breaks the seal"? I'm afraid you're going to need another citation for this claim about shrinkwrapped licenses. "The legal status of shrink wrap contracts in the US is somewhat unclear." [[Shrink wrap contract]] doesn't mention anything about non-US jurisdictions.

On Nov 13, 2007 12:03 PM, Oldak Quill <oldakquill(a)gmail.com> wrote: There's no sign that I can find, but that's with searching the Amazon online exerpts. I don't have the full book to doublecheck what its references listing was. -- -george william herbert george.herbert(a)gmail.com