[Fedora-legal-list] When can license notices be removed or not (Was: [Fedora-legal-list] Re: SPDX Statistics - R.U.R. edition)

On Mon, 2023-09-18 at 20:47 -0400, Richard Fontana wrote: > On Sun, Sep 17, 2023 at 11:37 AM Mark Wielaard <mark(a)klomp.org&gt; wrote: > > Something similar is done in glibc. For example several files I > > contributed to were adapted from some BSD release and have a file > > header saying the file is copyright the Free Software Foundation, > > Inc. This file is part of the GNU C Library. And the state they are > > distributed under the GNU Lesser General Public License 2.1 or > > later. But also have the original BSD notice in the file: > > > > /*- > > * Copyright (c) 1990, 1993, 1994 > > * The Regents of the University of California. All rights reserved. > > * > > * Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without > > * modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions > > * are met: > > * 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright > > * notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer. > > * 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright > > * notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the > > * documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution. > > * 4. Neither the name of the University nor the names of its contributors > > * may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software > > * without specific prior written permission. > > * > > * THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE REGENTS AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND > > * ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE > > * IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE > > * ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE REGENTS OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE > > * FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL > > * DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS > > * OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) > > * HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT > > * LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY > > * OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF > > * SUCH DAMAGE. > > */ > > > > But this is not the (effective) licenses, and there is no way to use > > the code under that license, since all contributions since 1994 have > > been done under the LGPL. > > Again, someone is making an assumption that something is there that is > still subject to that license, because otherwise it could be removed. No it cannot be removed. And no it doesn't mean it is still subject to that license. There is a Ship of Theseus argument to be made to just remove to no longer applicable notice. But a) that would just be rude. And b) the notice itself and the effective license both explicitly say you must retain the notice. > In review of Fedora packages over the past year, we have found a > number of cases where it seems clear a license notice no longer > applies to anything in the package, or never applied in the first > place. In at least one of those cases we recommended to the upstream > project that it remove the "phantom" license notice. That sounds like bad advise IMHO. It also destroys historical information.