Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site dagobah.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!allegra!mit-eddie!genrad!decvax!ucbvax!ucsfcgl!dagobah!mis From: mis@dagobah.UUCP (Mark Seiden, Lucasfilm System Group, 415-485-5011) Newsgroups: net.emacs Subject: Re: Legal Status of GNU EMACS Message-ID: <1754@dagobah.UUCP> Date: Thu, 27-Jun-85 17:14:25 EDT Article-I.D.: dagobah.1754 Posted: Thu Jun 27 17:14:25 1985 Date-Received: Sun, 30-Jun-85 00:04:08 EDT References: <211@harvard.ARPA> Organization: Lucasfilm Ltd. Lines: 47 Given Gosling's unequivocal statement about not giving anyone permission to do other than USE his emacs (which i also know to have been the case for years and years)... I have a sneaking suspicion that Stallman might just be making some kind of political statement here about the way he believes software should be. I cannot comprehend his questionable claim that any permission to copy allegedly given by Gosling to a third party is assumable by him. I happen to be in the slightly privileged position of being ALLOWED to USE (not redistribute) the code in GNUEmacs that rms is distributing (and possibly infringing the copyright of). Nonetheless, my fingers will do the walking away from GNU to jove, (for those small emacs-things not needing lisp-macros) and stick with Unipress Emacs for those situations where i want someone else to provide some guarantee of support. Zimmerman's statement about the legal implications for us guys who once intended to use GNUemacs I believe are correct: We, and our institutions could be infringing Gosling's copyright, and if we copy GNUEmacs, or redistribute it further, we certainly are. Stallman has chosen to put us in that position and no thanks to him for that. What Gosling or Unipress are going to do about it remains to be seen: - Stallman says they aren't going to do anything. I don't believe his claims or legal basis are correct, and find his statments on the matter selfserving and arrogant. And he's STILL pushing the point, and accused zimmerman of "browbeating" for raising the issue. (I'd like to hear what the MIT lawyers think about THIS one.) - Unipress has so far made no public statement. Since what they sell is as much service and support as "just code", perhaps there is no actual conflict for them. I know they're unhappy with the sitution, because now, either they're forced to act like bogey-men (they aren't), or feel "ripped off" because they're nice guys. If I were in their position i'd get an injunction preventing distribution of GNUEmacs. (What would YOU do if you were Gosling or Unipress and felt abused?) There IS a question of honor here, and now that i've been put on notice that Gosling didn't give Stallman permission to copy his code, I'm not going to use it and I hope you all will do the same. ("shunning"). Not that i don't appreciate his efforts, but i don't trust his motives, now that i've seen an example of how he implements them. Is gnu a software project, or a soapbox? m.