Copyright status

[Sven Langkamp]

On Sat, Jun 26, 2010 at 7:23 PM, JL VT <pentalis at gmail.com> wrote:

> After writing this message I think this isn't a Krita-specific discussion,
> but I want to bring it up here to see what you all think before I talk about
> it elsewhere.
> I think the FSF summarizes my concern better than I could, so please read
> this fragment:
>
> http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html#AssignCopyright
>
> Krita has a large number of contributors to many different files. Defending
> it in a court would be very difficult in its current state, so at the moment
> the enforcement of its license is just based on honor. I see many GPL
> programs pile up contributors, each owning a little piece of the software,
> eventually making the license hard to enforce against an hypothetical evil
> re-licenser (if he's evil, honor won't work!).
>
> In that sense, isn't using a copyleft license a moot point after all?, It
> only places restrictions on people willing to respect it, not on the
> hypothetical evil corporate users wanting to steal the code. A non-copyleft
> license would be just as functional and more convenient to those willing to
> respect it, in all cases except when there is few and well identified
> copyright owners to a program (or just 1, for example an institution, like
> the FSF).
>

We can't change the license so the discussion is hypothetical. GPL licensing
is more friendly for developers, the need to give back code is the return
service for the development of the code. I think it's just fair that I
benefit from the improvements that someone else does as much as he does from
mine. I would not contribute if a BSD license was used, as I think that that
it's not fair.

Also I think it's still possible to defend Krita against evil opponents. You
should not give up just because there is small risk that it might fail.
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