License for 4.4

[Thomas Leonard]

On Fri, 05 Jan 2007 13:27:54 +0100, Bernhard Walle wrote:

> Hello,
> 
> * Biju Chacko <botsie at xfce.org> [2007-01-05 08:19]:
>> 
>> I think we should change the text of all GPL licensed components in XFCE 
>> to GPL v2 only. This will allow us to move to GPL3 once we see a 
>> consensus in the community to move to GPL3. Otherwise we will be 
>> automatically switched when GPL3 is released.
> 
> No, nothing is "automatically switched". Xfce stays GPLv2, the "or
> later" clause only means that somebody can re-license it under GPLv3
> which basically means that he is able to include the source code in a
> GPLv3 project.
> 
>> I don't want to get into a license flamewar, but in my opinion we should 
>> only move to GPL3 when several other big projects have done so. I don't 
>> think any of us know enough about it, but I think it would be safer to 
>> go along with the majority of the community is doing.
> 
> Although I personally like the idea of GPLv2 only, I think that's not
> possbile. Xfce contains patches from many contributors, and you cannot
> change the license later without having acknowledges of every single
> contributor.

I think the problem is more going the other way: other projects (with the
"or later" clause) will no longer be able to copy code from Xfce.


-- 
Dr Thomas Leonard		http://rox.sourceforge.net
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