FSF stance on GPL issues.

[smoth]

TRUTH

That was a VERY good and clear explanation. mind if I cite you on it later?

[Peet]

What exactly happened to cause you to go from GPL-zealot to your current "so sue me!" state, Argh?

edit: and no, I'm not trying to elicit an over-the-top response, piss you off, or poke fun at your views, I'm really damn curious as to what caused this.

edit2:

I'm a Spring contributor, and thus am part of the GPL copyright holders group that would supposedly suffer "damages" for code in a free project that costs me money to make

How can you call yourself a contributor and a GPL stakeholder in spring if you explicitly refuse to stop breaching the engine's license until a lawsuit is thrown at you?

And on the other hand, how can you expect people to obey your own, amaturely written license if you scoff at the official and professional stance on the license you are breaching?

[smoth]

You need to GPL these scripts. (KDR and the FSF are of course right. He isn't a "harried staffer"!)

No. Sue me, if the FSF will take the case. I'm not changing the license until ordered to by a judge.

I'll be happy to have a day in court over this. I'm a Spring contributor, and thus am part of the GPL copyright holders group that would supposedly suffer "damages" for code in a free project that costs me money to make- I have no advertising revenue, etc., to offset my server costs, let alone my time, software, etc.

It'll look absurd in court, and I don't think the FSF will win, either.

I really really find this absurdly ironic.

[Radtoo]

The FSF can't sue. They however provide legal assistance to copyright holders who want to sue over the GPL, which makes it easier to sue.

And yes, you may put yourself at risk... any individual's code is copyrighted to them. They could each sue you over their code, as without the GPL, you have no rights to use it in any way.

Likewise for any distributors - they actually need to pay due dilligence that they have sufficient permissions to distribute.
If they reasonably should have known that something they distributed was without proper licensing to do so, they can be held accountable.

TRUTH

That was a VERY good and clear explanation. mind if I cite you on it later?

... no, I don't mind. It is a challenge to disprove me, if anything. And it was intended to go give the most relevant rules for people who don't want to read the gpl.

[KDR_11k]

I wonder if a court would rule using public interfaces as a derivative work, after all MS was forced to publicise their interfaces...

[Argh]

What exactly happened to cause you to go from GPL-zealot to your current "so sue me!" state, Argh?

Very simply, I was never a "GPL zealot". You probably have just forgotten (or missed) the real history of what happened. I have been pushed around, mainly by the same damn people, into different positions on this stupid issue, and I'm basically saying that I'm sick and tired of it, and am not going to go for this yet again.


Here's the history, from my perspective. Mind ye, this leaves out a lot of shouting by all parties involved.

1. I wanted to get NanoBlobs released, as the first "GPL-friendly" title for Spring.

I figured it was good for the project, since it could be then included in distros, etc., and meh, I'd get a little infamy. Good deal, eh?

2. I worked extremely hard to clean up all of the non-GPL stuff in NanoBlobs. Months later... it was ready.

3. I released it... and then faced the first of these "debates", because people wanted to use my then-revolutionary CEG code (this was back when nobody but me knew how to do decent CEGs).

4. Huge arguments ensued, because I had dual-licensed various parts of the game. The main content and code (all COB) was licensed GPL. The CEGs were licensed CC-SA.

5. After much huge argument... AF presented the "whole game" argument, saying that basically a game is either all GPL, or not GPL, but could not be dual-licensed.

I very reluctantly accepted this argument. This put the license of NB from dual to GPL, and set the stage for the rest of the disasters that followed.

6. Fanger asked to use the animation code from the Strider, to improve E&E walker animations. I said yes, and said, very explicitly, that it was GPL, assuming he'd been following the massive arguments, and knew what that meant. At the time, I thought this meant E&E would become GPL, and I explicitly told Fanger that I would support it becoming the "GPL-friendly" flagship game.

[EDIT]However, I was wrong. Fanger didn't know what the GPL would mean, and I didn't help him understand that. Therefore, what followed was mainly due to this misunderstanding.[/EDIT]

7. Fanger releases E&E, neglects to include any GPL notices, does not credit me, and when I call him on it, all hell breaks loose. Smoth gets with Fanger to write new animation code and attempt to cover up what's happened, and I blew my top and went ballistic. If you're wondering why I don't like Fanger, that's why, and it was well-documented at the time.

[EDIT]This is what I thought was happening, at the time. In Reality, Fanger was mainly confused about the GPL, and Smoth was just trying to quietly fix the problem. However, due to poor communications between us, I thought I was just being shafted.[/EDIT]

8. After huge baaaawing from all sides, Fanger's new code is in E&E, and I dropped the GPL arguments (which, btw... would be right back center stage now).

9. Everybody settles down. Then the next E&E is released, and it's chock full of CA Gadget code... again, without the GPL license text, which is required, no credit, etc.

And I blew my top, again.

Eventually, it's determined that since I have no standing to deal with it, that it's up to the authors to enforce at their leisure... which is where that issue remains, today. So I dropped it. It doesn't mean that that issue is dead, it's just out of my hands.





After all of this, I had a very long internal period of legal research and thought about this issue. My conclusions were that:

A. Treating games as anything but an aggregate does not really represent how they operate within Spring, in practice.

B. Spring, the project, is more hurt by letting people leech from each other than it is helped. Differentiation of games is an important part of making them successful, and we cannot get there if everybody just takes whatever they want from everybody else. If a game designer wants to limit distribution, that should be OK.

The primary driver of part B was watching what occurred with Chicken. Here CA had developed an obviously compelling new game-type, that could propel its audience share, and people not even associated with BA promptly leeched it, nixing their competitive advantage. From my perspective, this is not a healthy model for fostering really creative game designs.





Now I'm in a position where I've written a game design that I think demonstrates, very clearly, that games are "mere aggregates".

World Builder and P.U.R.E. are not explicitly linked. In fact, World Builder is linked to P.U.R.E... not the other way around, much as GPL projects can use DLLs that are not GPL. I am even planning to reverse the "include" line in the modinfos, in the final release, so that you can play "P.U.R.E. with World Builder" and "P.U.R.E.", demonstrating very clearly that the dependence that exists is entirely on the GPL side, not the (C) side.

As I've explained at length, previously... my intent is to give World Builder to the whole community. The source for P.U.R.E., however, I intend to give only to games that are not using OTA content.

The more that P.U.R.E. becomes an obviously mature and polished product, with features that are obviously things people will want to emulate... the more incentive there is for people to try and wrest control away from me. Which is why this keeps going on, so far as I can tell.

I mean... who the hell has all that much decent Lua written, besides me and CA?

S'44 probably has some, and they're equally reluctant to be forced to hand it over. Same with IW, and I'm sure that there's cool stuff in Gundam, etc.

I think it's no mystery at all, that the main people shouting their heads off in support of the FSF's legal theory aren't owners of their content. If you want my code, though, you will have to sue me for it, because I will enforce my license. If games like CA want to use it, they have to give up their primary advantage over the indie game designers, which is that they're using a familiar set of content. It's not my fault, that instead of sweating it out for a year, making a complete, two-faction game to a reasonable standard of quality, CA's people can't get their shit together and make new art that isn't in violation of copyright. But I'm not letting OTA mods just "Chicken" my source, short of being sued. I want the indie games to benefit, and they will, if they have the advantages provided by a lot of easy-to-use Lua source that does things like:

1. A newbie guide for players that is simple, direct, and obvious.
2. Point-and-see UI to provide help text, that works and is professional looking.
3. Music code, for supporting real soundtracks.
4. Lightweight grouping code, and example code for building units as squads.
5. Lots and lots and lots of example code, doing various special "powers" and other things.
6. Lots of BOS code that demonstrates some new, cleaner animation techniques that can greatly speed up production times.

Etc., etc. I know that some idiot will poo-hoo, and insist that P.U.R.E.'s just some silly thing that can't compare with CA. And they'll be right- it's not as large of a repository. There's only one of me, after all, and I have to sleep sometimes.

That said, it has a bunch of stuff that game designers will want to use, and it's worth fighting for the right to give it to the people I think should have it.



So, there ya go. I've made mistakes, I've learned from them, and now I have a different perspective.

I have mainly just sat this round out, tbh, because I already know what I'm doing, and why, but I'm getting tired of how people are taking such weak arguments seriously, tbh, when we've had deeper conversations about this already, and I thought we'd arrived at a compromise that was good for everybody:

1. CA's code would have to be treated as GPL, period

2. E&E and like games would remain (C) other than the GPL parts, etc...

3. If somebody wants to use multiple licenses, that's all right, so long as they're all respected.

In short, it looked like a win-win, and nobody lost anything. It seemed like a good way to resolve all this. But nooooo... KDR wanted to continue this...

In practical terms, where people aren't just trying for an absolutist approach... meh... anybody who actually has ever asked for something from me... knows that I'm flexible. CA's guys, for example, could ask me for an exception, and use my code under license. I just would not allow them to GPL it, PD it, etc. Not that I think that will happen, but I'm just saying, this isn't an absolute thing for me. Heck, I've been talking to NOIZe about World Builder, among other things.


Lastly... just to put this to rest... lemme be ultra-clear: if P.U.R.E. is ever in a position to be sold commercially... the only way that this whole giant mess affects that is if my content becomes GPL.

So, no, this isn't some super-secret plot to screw people over. If I wanted to sell it in its current state, I'd have to arrive at financial arrangements with various copyright holders anyhow, as RadToo alluded to (or get sued, rightly, for real damages), and meh, I'd probably want to kick some money to the Spring devs, too, just because. The possibility of that ever happening is rather remote, though. So this is not about money- that would change things considerably. It's about whether or not certain projects can leech from me. And the answer is "no". Ask permission, and maybe yes, depending on what it is and why.

And I will repeat, again... that any GPL / PD code writer who wishes to verify that the GPL work in World Builder (there isn't any GPL work in P.U.R.E. itself) has been properly accredited in my game, with license information intact, may get a copy at any time they wish.

If I give something away, and it has strings attached, that's a normal part of licensing, and I'm used to people having to ask for permission to use things, etc.- it's the polite thing to do, after all.

All accepting the central argument of the FSF will do is cause rampant leeching, and, in my case, I will have to enforce the GPL by requiring the license text be included in anybody's game which uses my work, etc.- iow, it'll just put me right back into the position of having to be an asshat, because so many people are too lazy to follow some simple directions, and a license that isn't enforced is basically worthless. So, no, we're not going to live in some hippy-dippy world, if this latest argument is accepted- I'm going to have to go right back to inspecting people's games for violations, etc., which is a huge waste of my time. I'd rather just know that unless one of my more obvious features shows up in a *A game... that it's all right, and I don't have to do anything.

In short, supporting this latest GPL theory is supporting me having to be a bitch again. I don't take it lightly, when people violate my copyrights, and the GPL doesn't change that- instead, it gives them more teeth. Do you people really understand the ramifications of this? Or are you stupidly assuming that because CA's coders just blithely allow everybody to use their work, improperly, that I would act the same way? Because I would not. When I license something other than PD, I am basically telling people what rules I'm following, and expect them to follow in return. Because otherwise the license is just a meaningless string in a Lua script.

[Neddie]

Rad, El_Cap is not at all confusing, and looking at both interpretations offered by you and he, neither can claim that their view is correct. Either one could be according to the visible logic of GPL. Use is not derivation. Your "Basics" overlook this very important distinction. Not that it matters too much, I suspect you aren't working with the right version of the GPL.

Here, I'll clarify/translate the text in black, then offer useful interpretation in red.

From the text of GPL 2, fabricated in 1991.
http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-2.0.txt

2. You may modify your copy or copies of the Program or any portion of it, thus forming a work based on the Program, and copy and
distribute such modifications or work under the terms of Section 1
above, provided that you also meet all of these conditions:
. . .
b) You must cause any work that you distribute or publish, that in
whole or in part contains or is derived from the Program or any
part thereof, to be licensed as a whole at no charge to all third
parties under the terms of this License.

You may change a GPL product or code, in whole or in part, to derive a work which must, among other things, be licensed under this license.

These requirements apply to the modified work as a whole. If
identifiable sections of that work are not derived from the Program,
and can be reasonably considered independent and separate works in
themselves, then this License, and its terms, do not apply to those
sections when you distribute them as separate works. But when you
distribute the same sections as part of a whole which is a work based
on the Program, the distribution of the whole must be on the terms of
this License, whose permissions for other licensees extend to the
entire whole, and thus to each and every part regardless of who wrote it.

The rules apply to the distribution as a single entity, components which are distinct from the derived work are not protected by GPL when distributed separately. They are only GPL as part of a GPL whole.

This prevents internal license conflict and protects your original components in aggregate while allowing you (the creator) full legal control when distributed outside the aggregate. In other words your standard copyright over original content remains, but is suspended when the element is in a GPL distribution.

In addition, mere aggregation of another work not based on the Program with the Program (or with a work based on the Program) on a volume of a storage or distribution medium does not bring the other work under the scope of this License.

The distribution does not extend to all the contents of the storage media.

Packages under other licenses may be stored with distributions of GPL content, and if they are not part of the same "distribution" which in our case could be interpreted either as archive or download. That is a note for mixed releases and installers - if you had a GPL Spring installer that called other installers and ran them to acquire and place non-GPL content you could argue effectively that they are different distributions with a level of interactivity while retaining a GPL-compatible engine installer.

4. You may not copy, modify, sublicense, or distribute the Program except as expressly provided under this License. Any attempt otherwise to copy, modify, sublicense or distribute the Program is void, and will automatically terminate your rights...

The sanctity of a GPL whole and GPL components must be respected for the rights to persist.

This makes no claims to the non-GPL separate original elements which are protected by GPL in the single distributed entity, provided that they were released separately. If they were not released separately, then the author has chosen to retain all rights implicitly, outside of the project to which they contributed.


Heh. Heh.


So, this is actually quite simple compared to the GPL 3.0 and whether intended or not there is considerable space to move within.

Red Hat also licensed their Fedora work under GPL 2.0, but to avoid any confusion they somehow enacted a GPL + Exception license, where non-GPL code could actually be distributed with it as long as it linked through controlled interfaces. Just a little curiosity for you all. A similar thing could be used to bundle individual games with Spring engine installs for professional game distributions, which otherwise would require separate or at least formally separate distribution of content.

[Argh]

If identifiable sections of that work are not derived from the Program,
and can be reasonably considered independent and separate works in
themselves, then this License, and its terms, do not apply to those
sections when you distribute them as separate works.

Then... er... how can we possibly consider a game, which is actually an archive containing many files within it, each of which is released separately from Spring, to magically become GPL?

The more quotes like this I see, the less tenable this position appears to me.

[Radtoo]

Use is not derivation.

I'm sorry. I had hoped that me saying "your stuff uses" (as opposed to "you use") makes it clear that uses of the likes of derivation, modification, or combination (as opposed to aggregation) are meant.

@Argh:
Yes, I was aware that you had trouble, and I'm sorry about that, but the GPL is enforcable by the copyright holders.

That should what my stake is in this (as I intend to redistribute a combined work...). I do not care about the very few lines I directly contributed per se, they really pale to everyone else's work...

Then... er... how can we possibly consider a game, which is actually an archive containing many files within it, each of which is released separately from Spring, to magically become GPL?

By the copyright imposed need for components to have permission to use / incorporate / modfiy / combine with others, or even to be redistributed. (I should attach a "loose terms/incomplete listing" warning, eh?).

And then by that some components are GPL'd and you have to meet its conditions. Of course they don't become magically GPL'd, but by meeting the GPL's conditions and thus acquiring permission to use / incorporate / modfiy / combine with others, they do.

Now, the LUA-in-Cob stuff combines (in my loose terms) with the GPL'd parts when you put it together with the engine, and thus needs to be GPL'd as this specific combined work... otherwise you can't have this!

[Argh]

Yes, I was aware that you had trouble, and I'm sorry about that, but the GPL is enforcable by the copyright holders.

Yes. I'm just saying, very simply, that I do not think it's enforceable, and would welcome a legal challenge at this point. At least it'd get this crap finally over with, one way or another.

Meh... it'd be one thing, if all projects included the proper documentation about the GPL from the FSF, as they're supposed to, and properly provided a "public notice", which in most contexts would translate as an in-game credit (this is how it's handled in P.U.R.E., fyi, for those who haven't seen it).

The problem with that... is that, as the E&E fiasco demonstrated, is that not only are there people unwilling to even bother with such a thing, but when called to obey the requirements, they refuse. And no, my current position is in no way hypocritical- I assert that the GPL is only to be applied to the specific scripts that were licensed as such- and as I will have provided both proper documentation and public notice in my final product, I am following what I believe to be the law here.

I will predict that if this position is accepted, the only people who would obey the License's explicit terms and conditions... would be people like me. Which I already am, as I understand those conditions. Except then I'd be right back into the very position I do not want to return to, of "enforcer", since most GPL coders seem entirely unwilling to enforce the very license they defend so vociferously. In short, it's not a solution that's likely to lead anywhere positive- people will still be breaking the law, and if they use my stuff, I will have to go after them.

By the need for components to have permission to use / incorporate / modfiy / combine with others.

That's the point I've been attempting drive home here. Most Lua scripts do NOT "combine" with anything else. They don't share anything except what is provided to them through the API itself. In short, they could be running in another engine entirely- the assertions about the "connections" are entirely based on the premise that no other engine except for Spring could possibly use those functions in an identical manner. I don't think that's a defensible argument, myself.

[Radtoo]

But that's the point I've been attempting drive home here. Most Lua scripts do NOT "combine" with anything else. They don't share anything except what is provided to them through the API itself.

That API thing is a dead give-away though. It's a "combination" (Warning: Not legal lingo) according to the GPL, as this does not fall under any of the clauses where it states which two things together are not a combination.

Now, the GPL voids as a whole if you do not meet any of it's requirements. At that point, you have no rights to do anything with the engine, by copyright. Not redistribution, not modification, not use... nothing - everything is blacklisted again. (National law may slightly reduce this to minor rights for private uses...) :)

In short, they could be running in another engine entirely

Without rights to use this engine, they would have to. :)

[Argh]

...except, as I've already stated, I don't buy that argument which you keep throwing out, as if it's true simply because you keep repeating it.

Try using direct quotes from their License to support that position.

As Neddie has already demonstrated, however, it does not really reflect what the actual text says...

[Neddie]

I'm sorry. I had hoped that me saying "your stuff uses" (as opposed to "you use") makes it clear that uses of the likes of derivation, modification, or combination (as opposed to aggregation) are meant.

Well, it didn't, your use of the language is imprecise and misleading. This is law, and law may not be rational considering it is based upon analogy, but it is entrenched in intentionally vague language for the sake of flexibility and emergent interpretation. We do not need to exacerbate the problem.

[Argh]

In short, the law is a bunch of words, and they get interpreted by human beings in a court of law. It isn't mathematics.

That said... most good law is very, very precise.

The GPL's primary problem, in terms of being enforceable in this nebulous context as proposed by the OP, is that that's an area where its legal language is very, very confusing, if not downright vague. It will take some serious cases to eventually determine what some of those paragraphs will actually mean. In the meantime, I will stick with what I believe to be true:

1. The games are aggregates of files within an archive.

2. Some contents of those aggregates may interact with Spring through API layers, but this does not constitute a "shared memory structure", which is one of the key concepts that we explored in some detail, the last time we had this debate, and frankly I thought it pretty much settled things.

3. Because they do not utilize a shared memory structure, the various scripts within a project do not constitute a "whole", and cannot be treated as such under the GPL.

4. Therefore, they are "mere aggregations" that may be legally treated as separate objects, and in no way are "infected" by Spring, since they exist wholly separately from Spring until a user runs the software. Their licenses have legal force, and should be treated with the respect due to the authors' copyrights and other rights, but aren't a "whole", nor are they "part of Spring" in any functional sense.


In short... the arguments for "mere aggregation" are quite good, and are founded upon the GPL's own language describing how it's supposed to be applied to software.

If we were talking about something like Pliant, which I brought up really deliberately because it's a true GPL language, that'd be another thing entirely. However, we're talking about two non-GPL languages- Lua and BOS. Therefore, the GPL extension that would exist if, say, the on-demand compiler was GPL are null and void, and can be discarded safely.

What's left of this entire argument is mainly people taking some guy who's never really looked at Spring in any detail's words at face value.

[smoth]

[Argh]

Yaaaar. Watch for falling words. You might get an "i" poked out.

[smoth]

3. I released it... and then faced the first of these "debates", because people wanted to use my then-revolutionary CEG code (this was back when nobody but me knew how to do decent CEGs).

nah, you just played with the dev version. I learned ceg myself and our ceg styles are different.

4. Huge arguments ensued, because I had dual-licensed various parts of the game. The main content and code (all COB) was licensed GPL. The CEGs were licensed CC-SA.

I don't recall this.

5. After much huge argument... AF presented the "whole game" argument, saying that basically a game is either all GPL, or not GPL, but could not be dual-licensed.

I very reluctantly accepted this argument. This put the license of NB from dual to GPL, and set the stage for the rest of the disasters that followed.

I argued against it explaining aggregate and you ignored my support

6. Fanger asked to use the animation code from the Strider, to improve E&E walker animations. I said yes, and said, very explicitly, that it was GPL, assuming he'd been following the massive arguments, and knew what that meant. At the time, I thought this meant E&E would become GPL, and I explicitly told Fanger that I would support it becoming the "GPL-friendly" flagship game.

yep, he misunderstood how it worked. People do that, which is why I hate gpl.

7. Fanger releases E&E, neglects to include any GPL notices, does not credit me, and when I call him on it, all hell breaks loose. Smoth gets with Fanger to write new animation code and attempt to cover up what's happened, and I blew my top and went ballistic. If you're wondering why I don't like Fanger, that's why, and it was well-documented at the time.

I like this rendition of yours. Yeah, I liked the part where you didn't tell fang what he did. I love the part where you threatened to sue him. I loved how it only took an evening to supplant everthing he ever borrowed from you.

Fact of the matter was you demanded that he remove the content and I helped him to it to help him comply. good rewrite of history. I didn't get with fang, I wrote animation by myself and gave him my effects

I like your rendition of history. Hang on while I print it out and jack off onto the print out.

[Radtoo]

We do not need to exacerbate the problem

Again, apologies - I tried to make it easier to understand, it didn't work out...

@Argh: You refer to this, I guess, and that it states:

If the program dynamically links plug-ins, and they make function calls to each other and share data structures, we believe they form a single program, which must be treated as an extension of both the main program and the plug-ins.

as an "and" condition, and that it will not be a single program if that "and" is just an "or"?

To quote Wikipedia:

Since there is no record of anyone circumventing the GPL by dynamic linking and contesting when threatened with lawsuits by the copyright holder, the restriction appears de facto enforceable even if not yet proven de jure.

This may not be the law or a totally reliable source, but it is very reasonable to assume.
It is also the "safe stance" on an uncertain issue - adopting the GPL eliminates the incertainity after all.
And my recommendation (not threat or anything, it NEVER was!) stands...

[Argh]

Since there is no record of anyone circumventing the GPL by dynamic linking and contesting when threatened with lawsuits by the copyright holder, the restriction appears de facto enforceable even if not yet proven de jure.

This isn't dynamic linking. This isn't all "one program" in any real sense. Users experience it that way, but it's an illusion.

@Smoth: Meh... do we have to do this all over again? Mistakes were made, by all sides. It's done and over with, and my retelling is what I thought / felt at the time. Truth is, it was a collection of huge mistakes by 3 very egotistical people.

[EDIT]There, the "history" has been corrected, with notes indicating what I thought / felt, as opposed to the reality. Hope that makes things clear.[/EDIT]

[smoth]

that is what I am saying, I do not see why you thought I was your enemy, I was trying to stop the fighting. I get mad that your perspective is that I did it to try and cover something up. You were vehement about your content and I was doing what you wanted.