Re: [gentoo-dev] Are "Copyright 1999-20xx Gentoo Foundation" headers bogus?

[Raymond Jennings]

+1 for at least having this discussed out in the open.

The issue of copyright did tickle my mind when I saw the headers during my
dev quiz.

On Mon, Oct 24, 2016 at 4:21 PM, Rich Freeman <rich0@g.o> wrote:

> On Mon, Oct 24, 2016 at 7:10 PM, Matt Turner <mattst88@g.o> wrote:
> > On Mon, Oct 24, 2016 at 4:07 PM, Rich Freeman <rich0@g.o> wrote:
> >> On Mon, Oct 24, 2016 at 6:34 PM, Matt Turner <mattst88@g.o>
> wrote:
> >>> In order to contribute to GNU projects, one must sign a copyright
> >>> assignment statement.
> >>>
> >>> Gentoo doesn't have anything similar as far as I'm aware, which makes
> >>> me question the legitimacy of "Gentoo Foundation" copyrights.
> >>>
> >>> What is the story?
> >>>
> >>
> >> The story of what?
> >>
> >> Are you asking whether they're legally binding?  You'd have to sue
> >> somebody to find out, because as far as I'm aware the matter is
> >> untested in court.  I think you could make an argument that
> >> voluntarily placing that header on your work is an assignment of
> >> copyright.  You could also argue otherwise.  A court would decide who
> >> wins.
> >
> > I'm asking whether we're just cargo-culting it along, or if we have
> > (had) some kind of system in place to assign copyright. I think Ciaran
> > answered: we used to but not anymore.
> >
>
> As I said, you could debate whether the present system already assigns
> copyright.  I don't think it is ideal.  It certainly isn't backed by
> any court decisions that I'm aware of.  That doesn't necessarily mean
> that it wouldn't be upheld if it did go to court.  There is really no
> way to be certain without trying it.
>
> But, it is better to rely upon methods that are already proven in
> court over ones that have yet to be proven.  I'm not disputing that.
>
> --
> Rich
>
>