[FFmpeg-devel] license violator seeking help to continue his behavior

[Diego Biurrun]

On Sat, Jul 25, 2009 at 11:21:18PM -0700, Cory Nelson wrote:
> On Sat, Jul 25, 2009 at 11:06 AM, Diego Biurrun<diego at biurrun.de> wrote:
> > On Fri, Jul 24, 2009 at 07:51:54PM -0700, Cory Nelson wrote:
> >> On Thu, Jun 25, 2009 at 1:12 AM, Diego Biurrun<diego at biurrun.de> wrote:
> >>
> >> Are you a lawyer?
> >
> > No.
> >
> >> I always thought the "will automatically terminate your rights under
> >> this License" line in the GPL was meant specifically for that instance
> >> of the violation -- and not as a permanent hold that lets the licensor
> >> apply new demands outside of the GPL before the licensee ever gets to
> >> distribute it again. ?I distribute some of my own code under the GPL
> >> and this is useful knowledge.
> >
> > Read paragraph 4 of the GPL version 2 (LGPL parapgraph 8 is identical)
> > again:
> >
> > ?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 under this License. However, parties
> > ?who have received copies, or rights, from you under this License will
> > ?not have their licenses terminated so long as such parties remain in
> > ?full compliance.
> >
> > There is not a word about rights getting restored in there. ?(L)GPL v3,
> > on the other hand, does have such provisions.
> 
> This raises another interesting point, if your interpretation is true.

It is the interpretation of the FSF and just about everybody else.

>  That paragraph doesn't mention that the copyright holder needs to
> explicitly revoke rights, or even notice a violation -- it just
> happens, the user loses the rights automatically.  I would guess that
> every single person owning copyright to (L)GPL ffmpeg code now needs
> to explicitly give him back the rights to distribute.  To distribute
> on a single person's go-ahead, in this case, would still be copyright
> infringement.

Correct.

Diego