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On Wed, Jul 16, 2014 at 10:50 AM, Ulrich Mueller <ulm@g.o> wrote: |
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> IANAL, but there is no such concept as "abandonware" in copyright law. |
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> Copyright can expire, at which point the work enters into the public |
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> domain. However, the time for that is generally too long to play any |
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> practical role for software (typically 70 years post mortem auctoris). |
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> |
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> Therefore we cannot distribute a package unless it is explicitly |
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> allowed by its license. |
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> |
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|
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Well, copyright law varies by jurisdiction. However, I don't think it |
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really makes sense for Gentoo to pursue this for a few reasons. |
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Please note that I'm completely sympathetic to the cause here - I just |
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don't think this is a wise way to go about it. |
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|
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This is legally a very risky thing to do. If you're going to do it |
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you want to take advantage of countries with friendly laws, etc. |
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Sticking a file on every Gentoo mirror is basically the exact opposite |
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of that - every one of our sponsors in countries all over the world |
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are open to lawsuit, and those targetting us could have their pick of |
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jurisdiction. |
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|
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Also, why combine a low-risk activity like running a distro with a |
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high-risk one like hosting abandonware. There is no technical |
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requirement to co-mingle these activities. Gentoo depends on lots of |
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servers/sponsors/etc for its core mission. Why put all of that at |
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risk for something that really isn't essential to our mission? |
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If somebody is interested in maintaining abandonware I'd take an |
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entirely different approach. It should be managed as its own upstream |
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project, completely independent of Gentoo or any other distro. They |
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should understand the legal risks, and structure their project in a |
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way that minimizes them, such as by operating in countries where this |
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activity is legal. |
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|
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Rich |