Re: [Fsfe-uk] Re: Freedom to take freedom

[Alex Hudson]

On Tue, 2008-01-22 at 20:29 +0000, Dave Crossland wrote:
> On 22/01/2008, Alex Hudson <address@hidden> wrote:
> > The license in this case is GPL + extra bits. The text of the license
> > says licensees may not add extra restrictions. But I still have to pass
> > it on under the license I received it - GPL + bits - because without
> > standing in copyright, or the right to sub-license, I can't change the
> > license on the work.
> 
> The text of the license says licensees may not add extra restrictions
> other than those in the license, and if there are other restrictions
> of any kind (typically patent ones) then you can't distribute the work
> at all.
> 
> That means, you can't redistribute the red hat fonts to me. But I can
> get them from Red Hat myself, and change them privately, whereas I
> can't change the Microsoft ones privately and why I initially
> recommend doing so to someone :-)

I don't know where your second paragraph comes from - I'm perfectly
entitled to distribute the Red Hat fonts to you. You don't get the
license from me; you get it from Red Hat - it's clear on that (to me, at
least, sec.6 - GPLv3 is even more explicit on this point, no
sublicenses).

The GPL doesn't require or use a sublicense, you don't receive a license
from the person who gave you the software - you get it from the
copyright holder. Given they are the licensors, it doesn't matter what
restrictions they append to the license in terms of internal
consistency; the license text is silent on the matter as far as I can
see.

Cheers,

Alex.