GPL3 Questions and Implications - - timbuctoo

GPL3 Questions and Implications

It has been suggested by Shane Martin Coughlan following a gently heated discussion on the discussion@fsfeurope.org mailing list, that a collection of questions relating to the GPL3 be collated and put to the FSF authors.

* Shane Martin Coughlan wrote, On 21/11/07 20:14:

Suggestion:How about we make a list of concerns that people have and I email BrettSmith with them?  That way we consolidate the concerns into onesubmission and potentially speed up the process of obtaining answers.MJ, Sam, perhaps you could coordinate the list of questions.

This page is setup for that purpose.

Readers: feel free to add comments or questions relating to GPL3 or AGPL, a compilation of which will be sent to Brett Smith by Shane.

My personal proposal is the creation of a list of implications of choosing a specific license to help prospective licensors choose (or avoid) a license according to their requirements.

My proposed implication is:

The GPL is widely considered a share-alike license where licensors have understood that the same terms will propagate throughout the distribution chain.

With the GPL3 this is not true: at some time in the distribution chain, derived works may have certain additional restrictions added, thus licensing the combined work under the AGPL such that when an original contributor receives the derived work with enhancements to his own work, he may not distribute any combination of his work with any of those enhancements unless he does so with the additional restrictions of the AGPL.

If the licensor finds this disparity objectionable then he may prefer to use the GPL2.

I believe that this implication is not widely understood and because ealier versions of the GPL are widely known to prohibit the addition of extra restrictions, this implication is also unexpected.