Re: [gentoo-dev] ACCEPT_LICENSE revisited

[Chris Gianelloni]

On Mon, 2006-11-20 at 18:28 -0800, Brian Harring wrote:
> I as an admin, set ACCEPT_LICENSE=RTCW-ETEULA; now if a user I've
> granted sudo to, goes and merges enemy-territory, have they
> explicitly agreed to the license?  Note the 'explicit', not 'implicit'
> as the glep throws around.

You, as the admin, did *explicitly* accept the license by adding it.

> Meaning the check_license interactive crap still is required.  Hell,
> your example in bug 152593, RTCW-ETEULA requires

Sure.

> "YOU ACKNOWLEDGE THAT YOU HAVE READ THIS AGREEMENT, YOU UNDERSTAND
> THIS AGREEMENT, AND UNDERSTAND THAT BY CONTINUING THE DOWNLOAD OR
> INSTALLATION OF THE SOFTWARE, BY LOADING OR RUNNING THE SOFTWARE, OR

Downloading and installing... that's what we cover.

As for *running* the software, Gentoo is not responsible for what a user
does on their own system.  We are responsible for the downloading and
installing, which is the part that we do.  Sure, it could be argued that
*we* don't do anything, since it isn't us typing "emerge
enemy-territory" but trying to cover ourselves is a good idea.

> BY PLACING OR COPYING THE SOFTWARE ONTO YOUR COMPUTER HARD DRIVE OR
> RAM, YOU AGREE TO BE BOUND BY THE TERMS AND CONDITIONS OF THIS
> AGREEMENT.  YOU FURTHER AGREE THAT, EXCEPT FOR WRITTEN SEPARATE
> AGREEMENTS, IF ANY, BETWEEN ID AND YOU, THIS AGREEMENT IS A
> COMPLETE AND EXCLUSIVE STATEMENT OF THE RIGHTS AND LIABILITIES OF THE
> PARTIES HERETO, RELATING TO THE SUBJECT MATTER HEREOF.  THIS AGREEMENT
> SUPERSEDES ALL PRIOR ORAL AGREEMENTS, PROPOSALS OR UNDERSTANDINGS, AND
> ANY OTHER COMMUNICATIONS, IF ANY, BETWEEN ID AND YOU RELATING TO THE
> SUBJECT MATTER OF THIS AGREEMENT."
>
> Read that again.  It requires that anyone even *using* the software
> has to have read the agreement, meaning that anyone merging it still
> needs to see the license (and have time to at the very least read it
> through, technically that in a multi-user setup any user able to even
> access that software has to be forced through agreement to the
> license.

Yes, and Gentoo has nothing to do with people *using* software.  We are
responsible for the downloading and installing.

How about this, instead?  Have you ever installed Enemy Territory
*without* using portage?

Try it.  Guess what?  You will get the EULA acceptance exactly *once*
during the installation, and never again.  Now, try running the game as
a second user.  You didn't have to accept anything, at all.  Hell, you
don't have to accept anything to download Enemy Territory.  Id assumes
that by "continuing to download" that you accept the license.  That's
pretty implicit, isn't it?

For those of us doomed to repeat history, you will know that I had a
*very* lengthy discussion with several people from Id Software back in
2003 about exactly this thing.  Their response was pretty simple, so
long as we duplicated the functionality that was provided by the
installer itself, we were fine.  Now, I even clarified that by
explicitly spelling out how it would work.  They understood
ACCEPT_LICENSE and agreed that since it was *not* automatic, as a person
who was responsible for the system was required to add the license to
that variable, that they were *EXPLICITLY* accepting the license to do
so.

> ACCEPT_LICENSE does *not* put us in the legal clear as you claim in
> comment #15, matter of fact tend to think it makes things worse since
> the setup assumes that one user setting ACCEPT_LICENSE is binding for
> all which is not a gurantee that can be made when it comes to the
> wording of all licenses.

It does with Id Software, which is the only company who has ever made
any sort of complaint, which is what brought about check_license in the
first place.  I have since extended that same usage to other company's
products that the license text said required it, even though they never
asked us to do any such thing, simply to avert any possible problems in
the future.

> unix does, and if ACCEPT_LICENSE set by some random user is able to

It isn't "some random user" at all.  It is the system administrator.
The one (or ones) responsible for such acceptance.  Again, *Gentoo* is
only liable for the downloading and installing, and not the execution.

> > Certain packages will *always* require interactive acceptance of the
> > license, as they currently do.
>
> Certain licenses, not packages.  It's possible for a package to be
> available under dual licenses, one requiring click through, one not;
> sounds daft, but it's possible since LICENSE depset supports use
> conditionals/flags.  Terminology mind you, but folks get confused
> (right marius?).

Uhhh... no.  What I said was correct.  Certain *packages* require
acceptance of their license.

-- 
Chris Gianelloni
Release Engineering Strategic Lead
Alpha/AMD64/x86 Architecture Teams
Games Developer/Council Member/Foundation Trustee
Gentoo Foundation