RE: What is GNOME office?

["Tom Musgrove" <TomM pentstar com>]

>I'm personally uncomfortable with the model of single copyright holders
>for important open source code (whether it be Sun or the FSF), personally,
>given my experience of how much mischief the copyright holder can cause.

>					- Jim


This brings up a question that has always lurked in the back of my mind.
Why does the FSF etc. require copyright assignment at the time of
contribution?  Would not the assignment be transferable at a later date if
the need for a legal challenge arrived?

I can understand for small patches from infrequent contributors, thus
backtracking the patches would be a PITA, however the chances of a small
patch being the basis for copyright infringement is unlikely.  However, for
large patches, especially from frequent contributors the same problem
doesn't seem to exist.

Tom M.
TomM Pentstar com