Re:Octotree – Proprietary Firefox extension contains AGPL-li...
by ajarmst on Sunday November 01, 2020 @10:45AM
(#24960196)
You keep making the claim that it's settled law that, regardless of license terms like permanence and unrevokability, any gratuitous license is trivially revokable by the copyright owner. Once again, I ask that you cite the jurisdiction, case law and precedent that you're basing that on.
Edit: it just occurred to me that even if that is true, its salience here might depend on what "gratuitous" means and whether it applies to the license in question. (I reiterate that IANAL, so usual cautions). Proponents of copyleft licenses would claim that licensor and -ee are both receiving value. The licensor receives the value of improvements and enhancements to their original work while the licensee gets access to the base system and permission to modify it to their needs as well as sharing the licensor's protections and value on their own contributions. There seems to be a plausible argument (reminder: IANAL!) that an exchange of value has occured.
Since the entire issue is that gratuitous licenses are, as a matter of law, revocable by notice regardless of their surface conditions, no, it wouldn't.
Such terms may make downstream licensees more secure that, in the event of revocation, courts will limit the effect of that revocation to avoid them incurring undue loss based on their reasonable reliance on the promises in the licenses while it was being offered under principles like promissory estoppel, though.