[Geany] Plugin licensing

[Nick Treleaven]

On Sun, 6 Jan 2008 00:41:28 +0200
Yura Siamashka <yurand2 at gmail.com> wrote:

> On Sat, Jan 05, 2008 at 03:18:02PM -0600, Jeff Pohlmeyer wrote:

> > The "VersionThreeOrLater" link seems to explain why the clause
> > is an advantage to end users, but I fail to see how that provides
> > any protection to developers who might not agree with the terms
> > in a future version of the license.
> 
> I belive something said here:
> http://www.fsf.org/licensing/licenses/gpl-faq.html#v2OrLaterPatentLicense
> 
> If you don't have to give up you patents, you don't have to pay 100000
> $ to any user either, even if such statement will appear in gpl >3.

Thanks, that link clarifies things in my mind at least ;-) Any developer
is only bound to the license that exists at the time the code was
released. The 'or later' bit is for allowing distribution under a later
version of the license.

To quote the link:

    "When you convey GPLed software, you must follow the terms and
conditions of one particular version of the license. When you do so,
that version defines the obligations you have. If users may also elect
to use later versions of the GPL, that's merely an additional
permission they have—it does not require you to fulfill the terms of
the later version of the GPL as well."

Another issue is whether you want the FSF to be able to control how
your code is distributed, but I don't think this is really a problem.
Even if the FSF was somehow taken over by some anti-GPL interest, I
think in a court of law a jury would find it strange that a
foundation that has 'Free Software' in the title would try to limit
user's freedoms. Probably a worst case scenario is that a future
version could in theory degrade to BSD-like terms. That's probably not
likely, and even if it happened it wouldn't be too bad, IMO. IANAL.

Regards,
Nick