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On 09/27/2018 08:42 AM, Rich Freeman wrote: |
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> On Thu, Sep 27, 2018 at 8:00 AM NP-Hardass <NP-Hardass@g.o> wrote: |
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>> |
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>> On 09/26/2018 03:25 PM, Ulrich Mueller wrote: |
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>>> Here is another small update of the copyright GLEP, resulting from a |
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>>> recent discussion on IRC. This is not a change of policy, but merely |
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>>> a clarification of the real name requirement: |
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>>> |
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>>> - The Signed-off-by line must contain the name of a natural person. |
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>>> |
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>>> - A copyright holder can be a legal entity (e.g., a company) in some |
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>>> jurisdictions. |
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>>> |
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>> |
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>> IANAL, but as per the Berne Convention, anonymous and pseudonymous works |
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>> are granted copyright protection. What's the rationale behind mandating |
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>> a real name? |
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> |
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> The DCO/GCO have nothing to do with obtaining copyright protection. |
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> This is always present if not waived. |
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> |
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> It is about showing due diligence in the event somebody claims that |
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> somebody ripped off their work and contributed it to Gentoo without |
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> authorization. |
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> |
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> If your real name is attached to a statement saying that you didn't |
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> steal the work, and you did steal the work, then they can go after you |
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> as well as Gentoo. That deters contributing stuff without checking on |
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> its legality. That same deterrence also helps show good faith on |
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> Gentoo's part. This is why organizations generally pursue these |
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> policies. |
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> |
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> If somebody violates a copyright anonymously, then they have no skin |
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> in the game. They can just disappear if anything bad happens. If a |
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> contributor isn't willing to stake their own money and reputation on |
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> the statement that something is legal to contribute, then why should |
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> Gentoo assume that they've put a lot of effort into the accuracy of |
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> that statement? |
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> |
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|
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And, AFAICT, this only applies to the Signed-off-by line (the |
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committer). The author may be anonymous or pseudonymous... So, your |
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statement is that people making commits to Gentoo must have real |
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names... and be public. This doesn't have any impact on whether the |
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source of the code is legit, just gives you a point of blame for who |
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actually committed it (which, TBH, doesn't mean much). I can say John |
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Doe committed code that wasn't legal. But i_steal_code_1337 authored |
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it... I guess we know not to accept code from him... or do we... since |
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we have no way of vetting authors. Making the restriction of names for |
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committers and not authors, IMO, has no weight. Requiring that all |
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contributions be from real named sources is a pretty drastic change, and |
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not what is being proposed, TTBOMK. |
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|
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But that's really besides the point... The current status quo (as is the |
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case with me) is that a committer may be pseudonymous under the |
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condition that the Foundation have that individual's name in the event |
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of a copyright issue. So, I still don't understand how forcing everyone |
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to publicly use a real name achieves something that we aren't currently |
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achieving... Is that incorrect? |
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|
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-- |
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NP-Hardass |
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