Re: [GNUe] The usual newbie licensing question...

[Reinhard Mueller]

Am Fre, den 08.10.2004 schrieb Wolfgang Keller um 19:17:
> I wouldn't mind making the source freely available myself (as this will
> probably give some feedback by more experienced people than myself and thus
> teach me lots of new things), but maybe a customer won't like having to pay
> for something (actually for my time while I'm doing it) when afterwards
> their competitors can just get the same thing that they paid for for
> free...

While I fully agree with Jason on the answer to your actual question,
I'd like to add that putting your application under GPL *doesn't* mean
"their competitors can just get the same thing for free".

The GPL is about rights *you* give to *them*, not the other way around.
When you wrote software, you always have the right to sell it to whoever
you want, and you can make a contract to sell it to smoebody exclusively
if you like - regardless of the license.

However, when you sell it exclusively to your customer via GPL, it means
that *your customer* is entitled to share the program with anybody he
likes - or of course with nobody at all.

So when your customer gets the program under the GPL, it's *always* an
advantage for the customer.

I know this is a very common misunderstanding and I just wanted to
clarify this here.

Thanks,
-- 
Reinhard Mueller
GNU Enterprise project
http://www.gnue.org
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
No army can stop an idea whose time has come.
        -- Victor Hugo, 1802-1885

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