Re: [gentoo-nfp] Question about other people's intellectual property

[Chris Gianelloni]

On Mon, 2005-04-11 at 23:53 -0500, Grant Goodyear wrote:
> Chris Gianelloni wrote: [Mon Apr 11 2005, 03:08:02PM CDT]
> > Enemy Territory, though free, has a restriction that would keep us from
> > distributing it in "modified form", which includes the installed form.
> > The only form that we can provide it in is the installer itself.
> >
> > If I wanted to get permission from Id to make, say, the old Gentoo Games
> > Enemy Territory CD and redistribute it, they would need to grant a
> > specific license to the Foundation to allow this, correct?
> >
> > Now, who/what would that license cover?  The Foundation?  All the
> > developers?  Our mirrors?
> >
> > What legal bindings does the Foundation have to say, developer Y?  Can
> > the Foundation engage in legal contracts on the behalf of Gentoo Linux?
>
> Good question.  I have to admit that I have no idea what the answer
> might be.  I would think that the Foundation could, and probably should,
> engage in legal contracts on the behalf of Gentoo devs.  The tricky part
> is that I'm not sure what, if any, ability the Foundation has to ensure
> that Gentoo devs live up to their part of the bargain.

That's pretty much what I'm afraid of...

I know that I would like to pursue some possible arrangements with other
companies, especially as I am now getting quite close to producing some
fun GameCD images, and quite a few of the "free" games from standard
game production houses have restrictions on redistributing them in any
form other than their original.

-- 
Chris Gianelloni
Release Engineering - Strategic Lead/QA Manager
Games - Developer
Gentoo Linux