right but unless you sign a contributor licensing agreement when you contribute then the copyright owner can’t relicense code you contributed.
so if you contribute to a GPL codebase it’s pretty legally perilous to try to unilaterally relicense code that isn’t “yours”.
this is pretty nebulous territory anyways, but I’d argue it’s pretty unethical to relicense to a more restrictive license essentially “taking” the GPL code from contributors
Well yes and no you can release them going forward under a new licence. If you obtained your copy under the old license you can use it under the old license when you obtain a new copy you have a new license agreement. Thats absolutly possible to do.
Revoking licenses is alot harder though and changing the lizens from a foss on to another is often confusing and business inapropiate. However it is legal.
Assuming newer versions are derived from code that was licensed GPL in the old version, the newer versions (which include new code) are also licensed GPL, whether the person writing the new code likes it or not.
No, this is plainly wrong. A license is a proclamation of the copyrightowner how others can use their material. The copywrite owner does not license their own work to themself, they can do whatever they want with their copyright. If you are not the copyright owner you have to have the license and afe only permitted to use the material after that license.
If you are the copyright owner you can relicense any way you want learn some copyright law.
right but unless you sign a contributor licensing agreement when you contribute then the copyright owner can’t relicense code you contributed.
so if you contribute to a GPL codebase it’s pretty legally perilous to try to unilaterally relicense code that isn’t “yours”.
this is pretty nebulous territory anyways, but I’d argue it’s pretty unethical to relicense to a more restrictive license essentially “taking” the GPL code from contributors
This is true, but it’s also true that the older gpl versions can’t be revoked.
Well yes and no you can release them going forward under a new licence. If you obtained your copy under the old license you can use it under the old license when you obtain a new copy you have a new license agreement. Thats absolutly possible to do. Revoking licenses is alot harder though and changing the lizens from a foss on to another is often confusing and business inapropiate. However it is legal.
Assuming newer versions are derived from code that was licensed GPL in the old version, the newer versions (which include new code) are also licensed GPL, whether the person writing the new code likes it or not.
No, this is plainly wrong. A license is a proclamation of the copyrightowner how others can use their material. The copywrite owner does not license their own work to themself, they can do whatever they want with their copyright. If you are not the copyright owner you have to have the license and afe only permitted to use the material after that license.
You’ll find the copyright owner is Sony.
So the original code wasnt gpl at all then. If this was true i would be pretty sure this repo would already be closed.