RE: OFF-TOPIC: License question...

From: Jeff Burrell (jburrell@ipass.net)
Date: 07/04/96


>    My guess - and this is ONLY a guess, ask the authors for the real
> answer - is that since the Circle license prohibits charging fees to
> distribute Circle, and since Circle add-ons are derived works of Circle,
> you can't charge others for code add-ons to Circle; your code would
> fall under the Circle license.

I strongly disagree. The patch he would be selling would be chunks of C
code. They can be applied to a circlemud. There is no way the owners of Diku
and Circlemud could even attempt to say that the code you wrote falls under
the circlemud licence. Why? Because it isnt circlemud. It's '<your name
here>'s code' and you could write your own licence for it. 

Unfortunately, it does fall under the Diku/Circle License.  It was made from 
CircleMUD code.  He didn't just write the code from space.  He used Circle's 
structures, variables and engine to actually make his code work.  The code was
written explicitly for addition into CircleMUD's code.  Therefore, it's considered a 
"derivitive work" as far as the Berne Convention and U.S. law are concerned.
Therefore, it falls under the copyright of CircleMUD, so he has to abide by the
license.  (BTW, it actually falls under the DIKU license since Circle is a derivitive
work of DIKU.)
	If he wants to make money selling his patches, he's free to implement them
without using Circle's structures, variables, or engine in mind.  This kinda mitigates the
usefulness of the code, but it is legal it doesn't have anything to do with Circle when he 
writes it.

-Jeff



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