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Re:Fork: A fast and friendly Git client for Mac and Windows by giancarlostoro on Wednesday July 24, 2019 @05:13AM (#20513447)
Worse yet these are not concrete points. Laws change. Things happen. Worse yet you need a lawyer from the appropriate jurisdictions just to figure out if you are lawfully using the software? At which point if you ignore the license now you are a pirate of sorts.
Re:Fork: A fast and friendly Git client for Mac and Windows by ceejayoz on Wednesday July 24, 2019 @08:39AM (#20514581)
That applies to any license, doesn't it?

Congress could abolish the public domain or ban stuff like the GPL.

Re:Fork: A fast and friendly Git client for Mac and Windows by gregmac on Wednesday July 24, 2019 @10:44AM (#20515779)
IANAL, but I'm fairly sure banning "stuff like the GPL" would mean banning every EULA and software license, as that's really all the GPL is.

Eben Moglen (Free Software Foundation) sums up the differences:

> But most proprietary software companies want more power than copyright alone gives them. These companies say their software is “licensed” to consumers, but the license contains obligations that copyright law knows nothing about. Software you're not allowed to understand, for example, often requires you to agree not to decompile it. Copyright law doesn't prohibit decompilation, the prohibition is just a contract term you agree to as a condition of getting the software when you buy the product under shrink wrap in a store, or accept a “clickwrap license” on line. [..]

> The GPL, on the other hand, subtracts from copyright rather than adding to it. [..] Copyright grants publishers power to forbid users to exercise rights to copy, modify, and distribute that we believe all users should have; the GPL thus relaxes almost all the restrictions of the copyright system. The only thing we absolutely require is that anyone distributing GPL'd works or works made from GPL'd works distribute in turn under GPL. [..]

https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/enforcing-gpl.en.html

Re:Fork: A fast and friendly Git client for Mac and Windows by dragonwriter on Wednesday July 24, 2019 @11:54AM (#20516485)
> IANAL, but I'm fairly sure banning "stuff like the GPL" would mean banning every EULA and software license, as that's really all the GPL is.

You can specifically ban (or make unenforceable) any subset of copyright licenses without banning copyright licenses generally.

Re:Fork: A fast and friendly Git client for Mac and Windows by jessaustin on Wednesday July 24, 2019 @12:15PM (#20516717)
How would that law be written? If it mentioned GPL by name (which I don't think would be Constitutional?), we'd just use a different name for it. If it zeroed in on particular legal idioms used by GPL (which probably are also used by thousands of other licenses), GPL could be modified to use different idioms. If the law were general enough to take out GPL for good, it would be general enough to take out all software licenses for (very) good.
Re:Fork: A fast and friendly Git client for Mac and Windows by reallydude on Wednesday July 24, 2019 @12:02PM (#20516582)
> would mean banning every EULA and software license

That seems proper. AFAIK, these have (statistically) never protected the public, so the legalese is there for protect the company's ability to restrict and penalize the user, as well as fill the pockets of lawyers.

Re:Fork: A fast and friendly Git client for Mac and Windows by HelloNurse on Thursday July 25, 2019 @05:57AM (#20524030)
No, the problem is with general and sudden redefinitions of stuff like "illegal activity", which makes the license as written vague and unstable, even without changes to contract and copyright law that would interfere with the more basic level of offering, accepting and enforcing a license (irrespective of its content)
Re:Fork: A fast and friendly Git client for Mac and Windows by giancarlostoro on Wednesday July 24, 2019 @09:58AM (#20515308)
The GPL is much more specific in its terms. I imagine people who break laws wont care about this software license anyway. You cant stop criminals by giving them more rules / laws to follow. Just wont ever happen.