Re: Evolution copyright assignment: Storm in a teacup

[Richard Stallman <rms gnu org>]

    Rui's point was simply that arguments of the form, "Perhaps you're right,
    but company X is friendly so we don't have to worry about that," may be
    dangerously misguided.  That point is extremely relevant, and I hope the
    (friendly) Novell/Ximian guys don't take any offense by it.

Corporations can easily get new management.  They can also be acquired
by other corporations with different policies.  This change can be
good or bad.  When Novell acquired Ximian and SuSe, it liberated some
(all?) of their former non-free products; that was good.  But a change
for the worse can happen just as easily.

The point of a contract is to spell out the relationship
so that instead of relying on someone else's good will, one
can rely on the contract instead.