Mailing-List: contact cygwin-help AT cygwin DOT com; run by ezmlm List-Subscribe: List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: , Sender: cygwin-owner AT cygwin DOT com Mail-Followup-To: cygwin AT cygwin DOT com Delivered-To: mailing list cygwin AT cygwin DOT com X-Authentication-Warning: slinky.cs.nyu.edu: pechtcha owned process doing -bs Date: Thu, 6 May 2004 13:47:03 -0400 (EDT) From: Igor Pechtchanski Reply-To: cygwin AT cygwin DOT com To: Dave Korn cc: cygwin AT cygwin DOT com Subject: RE: GPL violation ? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: References: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII X-Scanned-By: MIMEDefang 2.39 On Thu, 6 May 2004, Dave Korn wrote: > > -----Original Message----- > > From: Christopher Faylor > > Sent: 06 May 2004 16:56 > > > On Wed, May 05, 2004 at 07:08:59PM +0100, Vince Hoffman wrote: > > >This comes up on here every now and then and if i didnt > > think it was a > > >possible issue i wouldnt have brought it up. Mind you IANAL > > http://cygwin.com/acronyms/#YANALATEYHSMBSI :) lol! > > However, the real point I wanted to mention is that > http://cygwin.com/assign.txt seems almost certain to be invalid under UK > law, and quite possibly under US law too. (evil laugh) > You can't have a contract without an exchange of something of value. > Hence the line about "For good and valuable consideration, receipt of which > I acknowledge". But *what* consideration? AFAICS, since nobody's ever been > paid so much as a wooden nickel for their cygwin contributions, every claim > to have been in receipt of such consideration is false, and so every single > one of the supposed contracts is currently in breach and therefore none of > the assignments are valid. You do get a T-shirt for filing the assignment, which is intended to cover all of your subsequent contributions. > I'm slightly alarmed to notice this and wonder what the RH legal team have > to say about it? I think the RH lawyers may need to spend some time sending > people peppercorns through the post, along with a letter apologising for the > late payment! > > [ Here are some references for anyone who wants to research this themselves > a bit: > > http://www.google.com/search?q=peppercorn+rent+contract+validity > > http://www.google.com/search?q=sufficiency+of+exchange+contract+validity+peppercorn > > http://www.encyclopedia4u.com/c/consideration.html > An illusory promise, or one which the promisor actually has no obligation to > keep, does not count as consideration. The promise must be real and > unconditional. > > http://law.wustl.edu/Organizations/SBA/Outlines/Contracts%20-%20OUTLINEBIG.htm > b. Saying there is consideration is not consideration, neither is a seal. > Nominal consideration which means nothing is not consideration. ] In addition to the physical payment of a T-shirt, the developers get the goodwill of the community, although I don't think this could be counted as "consideration" under the above definition, no matter how good and valuable it is. Igor -- http://cs.nyu.edu/~pechtcha/ |\ _,,,---,,_ pechtcha AT cs DOT nyu DOT edu ZZZzz /,`.-'`' -. ;-;;,_ igor AT watson DOT ibm DOT com |,4- ) )-,_. ,\ ( `'-' Igor Pechtchanski, Ph.D. '---''(_/--' `-'\_) fL a.k.a JaguaR-R-R-r-r-r-.-.-. Meow! "I have since come to realize that being between your mentor and his route to the bathroom is a major career booster." -- Patrick Naughton -- Unsubscribe info: http://cygwin.com/ml/#unsubscribe-simple Problem reports: http://cygwin.com/problems.html Documentation: http://cygwin.com/docs.html FAQ: http://cygwin.com/faq/