Learning More About KDE's Plasma Next Desktop

[interested]

I've heard my share of lame excuses for CLA. But this..

Oh. And you still need to learn the difference between CA and CLA.

There is no legal distinction between CA and CLA. They cover exactly the same, namely transfer of IP rights. You do the same when contributing to an OSI approved license project like GTK+, but just in an informal matter. That leaves more wiggle room for lawsuits, but since many Free Software projects are non-commercial (e.g. have no money), it usually doesn't matter.

If one of the small companies that has GTK+ commit access goes bankrupt, the creditors could in theory claim that all the contributions now was owned by them. But while the creditors couldn't get money from the GTK+ project itself, they could make life unpleasant for upstream users like Red Hat who actually have money. With a CLA such claims would just die before trial, since contract law is so well established. Scenarios like this are exactly why FSF started demanding CLA's a long time ago.

[TheBlackCat]

No, copyright is whole different business than a broad license. And you know it. Why lie about it?

You do know people can look at the post directly above yours and see that interested provided specific reasons for the claim, reasons you completely ignored, right? Cutting out parts of a post you don't like isn't going to convince anyone when the post in question is immediately before yours.

[interested]

No, copyright is whole different business than a broad license. And you know it. Why lie about it?

I can see you don't have any legal experience either. FSF's CLA is all about the copyright and therefore the license, since the copyright holder has the right to license since they are the legal owner of the IP. This is why the FSF can represent GNU projects in court, even though independent developers have made the program.

By contributing code to a OSI license approved project, you implicitly assign away certain IP rights (depending on local law and the wording of the license) just like when signing a CLA, by agreeing to the projects license. This informal IP transfer from the contributing developer is usually good enough, but there are loopholes that can be used to attack the project. All major open source projects like BSD and Linux have been under attack from entities that used copyright of code as a weapon, which is why the FSF still insist on their CLA even though the legal validity of many aspects of the GPL license now have been tested in court.

[schmalzler]

CLA is irrelevant regarding Qt usage because it is LGPL. Furthermore there is the Free Qt Agreement, that we already discussed:

http://www.phoronix.com/forums/showthread.php?85034-GNOME-Gets-A-Log-Viewer-For-Systemd-s-Journal&p=362218#post362218

You are no lawyer. You don't know what you are talking about. You are spreading FUD all over again. You KNOW you are telling lies. So just stop it, please.

[schmalzler]

Let us assume you ae correct; Then the CLA can be removed. Everybody win.

You once more prove you are no lawyer.

[interested]

You are confused. CLA does not touch copyright. FSF asks for CA. Is it really that hard to understand?

You didn't notice this big fat head line on FSF's site about their CLA:
"Why the FSF gets copyright assignments from contributors"

http://www.gnu.org/licenses/why-assign.html

You just don't get it. I will try the very simple version: there is no legal difference regarding IP in contributing code to a GPL licensed project, and doing the same with a project that require a CLA for their GPL licensed code. In both case do the developer transfer certain IP rights.

To sum up: CLA = explicit agreement to the license. Code contributions without CLA= implicit agreement to the license.

There is however a difference in how well protected and enforced the code is, since a signing of a CLA is under contract law, and therefore easy for the courts to handle with a strong protection for the entity with the assigned rights. Without explicit assignment, there can be some legal loopholes that can be exploited.

It is the wording of the license that is interesting, not whether the developer signs explicitly or agrees implicitly. Both the FSF and the Qt have license agreements that ensures the code will always remain Free, even in case of bankruptcy or similar. Since the license is backed by signed CLA's it is extremely strong protection in courts around the world.

GTK+ doesn't have the same insurance, meaning that a really vicious creditor (and boy do they exist) can try to claim ownership of parts of the code in certain cases. Not a likely scenario since GTK+ doesn't have any money, but crazy lawsuits are a matter of fact.

[schmalzler]

And I ask you again: CLA does not touch copyright. FSF asks for CA. Is it really that hard to understand?

And it does not matter at all because Digia (or any other future "owner" (read: commercial license service provider) of Qt) can't close down Qt completely. Canonical COULD close down their now open source projects, because they don't have something like the free Qt foundation. So everyone who would contribute (CONTRIBUTE, NOT ONLY USE!!!) to Qt will be able to do so, bcause the code WILL BE OPEN SOURCE FOREVER! Only if a CONTRIBUTOR does not like his code be released under a proprietary license for Qt commercial licensees alongside with LGPL, he won't sign the CLA.

Try to get that memorized: For a user, even a programmer who writes software using Qt, the CLA does not matter. Qt will be free. Forever. Proved by lawyers over and over again.

[interested]

And I ask you again: CLA does not touch copyright. FSF asks for CA. Is it really that hard to understand?

As I said before, the FSF copyright assignments is a CLA. It is also a copyright transfer, but it still, it is also a CLA (Contributor License Agreement).

As I said before, the interesting thing is not whether you explicitly sign or implicitly agree to a license, but the wording of the license. The Qt and FSF CLA's ensures the code will always remain Free.

GTK+ code doesn't enjoy the same legal protection. I don't think it matters much in the case of GTK+, but the project would be much safer if the main/paid developers had signed (voluntary) CLA's making the same assurance as the Qt CLA.

[schmalzler]

That was not an answer to question. Is it that hard to admit you were wrong about FSF asking for CLA?

I am not the person you think you answered to. Don't get confused.

[interested]

Is it really that super hard to understand that FSF asks for CA, not CLA? You really amaze me. Why do you want to prove that you are able to deny simple facts? Some claim the redeemer was born by a virgin and others claim that the Qt commercial CLA is the same as FSF-style CA. Yay, religion

I think your lack of legal knowledge is contributing to the many errors you make in your assessments. As said before, the FSF copyright assignment is also a CLA. The point being that FSF only accepts copyright assignments from certain licenses (or at least, will re-license to a proper FSF license if they ever should get unlicensed code assigned.)

So the fact is, that any transfer of copyright to FSF is also a CLA where the contributor also sign his acceptance of the e.g. GPL 3.0 license while transferring copyrights too. It is quite simple really, FSF only accepts code where the contributor have signed a license agreement (CLA). GNU.org have lots of information on this in case you are genuinely interested.

As said before, this CLA gives FSF projects legal protection against hostile legal attacks and ensures the code will always remain Free, just like the Qt CLA. GTK+ and many other projects doesn't have that protection.