Mail Archives: cygwin/2006/08/14/08:24:11
Corinna Vinschen wrote:
> On Aug 14 11:24, Darryl Miles wrote:
>> Corinna Vinschen wrote:
>>> Please don't forget the "Before you get started" drill as descibed
>>> on http://cygwin.com/contrib.html
>> I do have questions, they may seem daft, but this issue is legal thing
>> so the finer points are important:
>> [...]
>
> IANAL, but the minimum points should be clear:
>
> - The copyright assignment gives Red Hat the right to use the code which
> has gone into Cygwin. It doesn't influence former or later work of
> you which has never been applied.
But its not clear from the agreement how the distinction is made between
my code that is covered by the agreement and code which is not. So I'm
just confirming the default situation is that my work is not covered
under the agreement unless I have explicitly stated otherwise.
Leaving the onus on the committer to gain consent on a contribution by
contribution basis. Not a cart-blanche assumption everything is covered.
> - You never lose your own work, so what you contributed to Cygwin is
> still yours. You can always reuse your own code in other projects.
> The idea is to make sure that you don't revoke the right from Red Hat
> to use the code you've contributed.
Okay that clear that point up, my original rights remain.
>> So are there any alternative options to contribute for those not wishing
>> to enter into a commercial legal agreement with a profit generating
>> organization in order to contribute to an (almost-)open source project ?
>
> No. If you want to contribute to an FSF project like, say, gcc or gdb,
> you have to sign a copyright assignment as well. The situation is not
> different for Cygwin, it's just Red Hat instead of the FSF which is the
> copyright holder for the project. As for any other question: IANAL.
My objection is that RedHat is a profit generating organization that can
be bought out or sold in the future and that the companies article of
association (the primary objective of the company) may be amended at the
whim of current and future shareholders.
Where as the FSF (and I think Apache Foundation and Eclipse Foundation)
are organizations which are not for profit with a specific clear
purposes to manage copyright and intellectual property for the good of
their communities.
I am happy for Redhat to make money from my contribution, but I am not
happy to enter into a one sided legally binding agreement with a
commercial entitiy when there is no commercial gain in it for me.
Especially when I can't see any justification for the scope of contact
as written to be so large. This is not a win-win legal situation.
Maybe Redhat should setup the "RedHat Foundation" a separate legal
entity and company that can offer its community some legal protection if
it wishes for the community to fix RedHat copyrighted code.
Or Maybe Redhat should not have "copyright assignment agreement" but
more a "license from the copyright holder to grant redhat less
restricted use of the code than GP provides into the future". If that
really is all it wants from me, I'd be happy to sign that.
The only thing I can immediately think of, is that RedHat might want
license to redistribute my work in binary only form. Which I'd be happy
to grant. This is because it goes against the GPL so needs explicit
legal cover from the copyright holder.
But I believe handing over copyright effectively makes the result an
intellectual property asset that Redhat has complete rights over, just
like they do over work created by programming employees. Which goes
against the reasons why CYGWIN was utilized here in the first place and
that was because its a GPLed entity, so I'm wishing to contribute back
to that GPLed entity, but not necessarily the original commercial RedHat
version.
Removing my copyright and replacing it with Redhat's under an open
agreement that is vague about the scope of my work that will/wont be
covered is a massive step compared to releasing the patch under GPL and
additionally granting RedHat Inc the specific license (directly from me)
to also have use less restricted use (than GPL) into the future.
Number one priority for me it to implement a fix first and understand
the legal situation in due course I'm sure it will workout.
Thank you for your comments,
Darryl
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