Re: Open Letter to Octave Community

[Judd Storrs]

On Mon, Oct 18, 2010 at 11:07 PM, Carmine Napolitano
<address@hidden> wrote:
> We believe we expressly provided a "carve out" for open source licenses with
> the following sentence under the Use of Material From This Site:
>
> " Occasionally, material within the Site which is designated C Equalis LLC
> may also be designated as distributable under special license terms (for
> example a General Public License (GPL) or CeCiLL2
> license). Such material is exempt from the general restrictions outlined
> above and is instead subject to the specific terms of the referenced
> license."

I think this passage was offered previously, but I do not see its relevance.

Firstly, it applies to users of the site, not to Equalis or its
employees and does not seem to limit the powers that are asserted by
Equalis in "Material You Submit". Secondly, this passage is a truism,
Equalis is obviously free to license its materials under the GPL,
CeCiLL, or any other license--the copyright holder may always do
whatever it wants. Lastly, copyright for user submitted files remains
with the submitter and would obviously not be designated "C Equalis
LLC" (as affirmed in the "Material You Submit" section).

I do agree that squabbling over the TOS is pointless if nobody can or
wants to use the site. I'm by no means important to octave
development, so I'll shut up and see if anyone else has an opinion.


--judd