Re: somewhat urgent
On Tue, May 16, 2000 at 01:16:03PM -0500, abs1nthe wrote:
> I'm writing a rather long essay about open source and free software.
> it's a legal article. i wanted to know about the copyright issue for
> debian distributions. i know you include a copyright notice for each
> distribution, but do you also include a list of who made what contributions?
> i am under the impression that you do not. if you do not, do you maintain
> a list of who did what to the code?
This is documented in the Debian FAQ, section 4.2 "Who wrote all that
software?", at:
http://www.debian.org/doc/FAQ/ch-software.html#s-softwareauthors
Each and every of our packages, besides having the copyright file, also have
a Debian changelog file that list all changes done in the package by the
package maintainers/uploaders.
> i am also interested in the issue of copyright infringement. if you find
> a case of infringement does debian as an organization go after the
> infringer or does the author of the code infringed go after the infringer?
I know we don't allow programs with problematic licenses (e.g. mixed
incompatible licenses, or licenses that prohibit distribution etc),
as per the Debian Free Software Guidelines, at:
http://www.debian.org/social_contract#guidelines
I don't think we ever had SPI, our legal entity, sue anyone over
something... that doesn't of course mean it can't happen...
--
Digital Electronic Being Intended for Assassination and Nullification
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