Re: Mixing GPL and non-copyleft code in source files

[Wojtek Kosior via "Development of GNU Guix and the GNU System distribution." <guix-devel@gnu.org>]

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Hi there

> It's worth noting that CC0 is not a license but a public domain
> dedication.  One cannot dual-license it with GPL because copyright
> no longer applies to the work: https://creativecommons.org/faq

Actually, in some countries' laws there is no notion of public domain
and it is not possible to waive one's copyright there.  CC0 would fall
back to being a license there.

Also, due to this ambigious status of public domain, there were cases
of business users asking authors of public domain software to also add
a different license.  But this is a rather rare, overcautious approach
and definitely not needed with a carefully-designed waiver like the CC0.

I think my response to Liliana 2 minutes ago is also a sufficiently good
response to the remaining remarks I could otherwise address here.  If
not, please tell

Best
Wojtek

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On Sun, 24 Dec 2023 13:15:05 +0900 Nguyễn Gia Phong <cnx@loang.net> wrote:

> On 2023-12-24 at 03:41+01:00, Liliana Marie Prikler wrote:
> > Publishing some source code under the GPL v3 (or later)
> > does not preclude [someone] as the sole author
> > from also publishing it under the CC-0.  It does
> > defeat the purpose of the GPL if you, however,
> > because whoever wants to make a proprietary spin-off
> > will simply take the CC-0, since whereas the GPL
> > gives you access to all the changes when they redistribute it,
> > the CC-0 gives you bupkis.  
> 
> It's worth noting that CC0 is not a license but a public domain
> dedication.  One cannot dual-license it with GPL because copyright
> no longer applies to the work: https://creativecommons.org/faq
> 
> A CC0 patch to a GPL software does not change the licensing status
> of the software, and any modification on top of the public domain
> works can continue to be under the GPL.  This goes for other parts of
> Guix that alone are not copyrightable like the list of facebook hosts.
> 
> Furthermore, even if the author decides to dual license it, it makes
> no difference to predatory corporations whether if the information
> about the permissively licensed snippets are documented mainline:
> that piece of code is still licensed that way.  However, once again
> note that the dual-licensed modules will become copyleft after
> any modification under the GPL.
> 
> The intention of the GPL and software freedom is to protect the freedom
> of end-users: it concerns their rights over the overall program.
> As long as the program is still copyleft, it would not be possible
> to distribute any non-free derivative.
> 
> Now you could argue that if a large part of the codebase
> is permissively licensed, the rest could be easily rewrite to produce
> a proprietary work.  While that is true, the viral property
> of copyleft would render this practically impossible, as the chance
> of the same parts of guix is contributed solely by people preferring
> permissive licenses is really low considering the total number
> of contributors.
> 
> I understand the fear of a copyleft work being tainted,
> it is just irrational in this very case.  On the other hand,
> encouraging patches under any GPL-compatible license would put
> unnecessary burdens on the maintainers to document which snippet
> to be under what license.  This is even beyond the scope of REUSE
> which would optimistically already take days to implement for guix.
> 
> For this reason, I think it is a reasonable ask for contributions
> to be under the same license and authors can self-publish the patch
> under a different license if they wish to.  As mentioned, those hunks
> will not stay permissive forever in guix anyway, nor that guix
> owes contributors the favor to allocate resources on something
> that does not dirrectly support its mission.

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