[MUD-Dev] Diku & GPL

[Richard.Woolcock at rsuk.rohde-schwarz.com]

Jon A. Lambert wrote:
>
> Patrick Dughi wrote:
> >
> > As luck would have it, it is possible to simply provide a choice:
> > Either use the Diku license, or use GPL.  This is the choice that
> > the individual distribtors would have to make, and where applicable,
> > current Users of the many different (including Diku itself) codebases.
> >
> >  It is an either-or choice though, and does have to be made.  The
> > default of course, would be the existing Diku license.
>
> No this is illegal and dare I suggest unethical.
> There isn't any way one can GPL a DIKU derivative codebase short of
> the Diku authors GPLing it themselves.

I think you misunderstand Patrick.  I believe what he is saying is that
if the Diku team choose to re-release Diku under the GPL, people who are
using the Diku code will be able to choose which license they would
rather use.

> > The choice seems to rest with the DikuMUD team, and then potentially
> > with the individual distributors.
>
> The former.  The latter cannot remove restrictions placed by the former
> they can only add additional restrictions.

And I believe this is referring to the authors of the various Diku
derivatives.  For example if Diku re-released under GPL, then Merc could
choose to also re-release under GPL if they wished.  If they did that,
then I could re-release GodWars under GPL - which means that anyone
using my GodWars codebase could choose either license.  Say (for example)
Russ Taylor decided that he didn't want to re-release ROM under GPL, even
if the Merc and Diku teams had done so, then nobody using ROM could choose
to use GPL, and the author of ROT couldn't redistribute under GPL either.

My apologies if that's NOT what Patrick mean't!

--

KaVir.


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