Re: GPLv3/L8R - How should the copyright notice look?
On Mon, Oct 4, 2010 at 1:23 AM, Robin Paterson <scot_paro(a)yahoo.co.uk> wrote:
> A copy is the license is of course included in the XEmacs
> distribution. What I'm suggesting is that when we switch to GPLv3 or
> later license we should adopt the same wording as in Emacs. Previous
> versions said that if you didn't receive a version of the GPL you
> should write to the FSF supplying the full address. Now it says "see
> <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>." which is much shorter and will
> possibly not change.
>
As I said before, so long as a copy is in the distro (which it is),
having a link as well is a bit more 21st century. Personally, I'd have
a snail address too. With my legal head on, I'm considering the
scenario where someone abuses the licence and is looking for excuses for
not having been able to read the licence, or otherwise obtain a copy.
What happened is that the FSF moved, invalidating their snail mail
address in all of the license notices in all of their source files
(and a lot of other peoples' files, too). They didn't want this to
happen again, so instead of updating the notices with their new snail
address, they replaced the snail address with that URL, which would
never have to change.
Probably, it's wisest to follow their lead in this matter -- after
all, they might move again, and you might not know until months later.
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