[Bf-committers] extension clause

[Benjamin Tolputt]

On 22/11/2010 8:06 PM, Dan Eicher wrote:
> So, yeah, according to the FSF a stolen version is ok to distribute...
> not that I agree with their reasoning on this though.

This is also the conclusion of the legal representation I've been able
to talk to about it (in regards to licensing software which had trade
secret code mixed in with GPL code). They too thought it was a stupid
result, but it is a valid reading of the license terms (and good lawyers
are good at finding the worst possible, yet still valid interpretations
of legal clauses).

In my experience, this resulted in weird situations where vital parts of
company infrastructure were "leased" from a third-party mixing GPL code
in with code containing (dubiously valued) "trade secrets". As the code
itself never left the corporate property of the developers, it was
classified as not being "distributed". This, however, was in a server /
network environment. Blender, being a client utility, does not lend
itself to such "creative" solutions.

-- 
Regards,

Benjamin Tolputt
Analyst Programmer