Re: ORBit2 and linc - licensing?

[Jon Trowbridge <trow ximian com>]

On Wed, May 30, 2001 at 10:53:24PM +0100, Sander Vesik wrote:
> 
> Well... if you really wanted to get an answer in this or any other matter,
> you would go to your (company's) lawyers and ask them. Is FSF qualified to
> give legal advice?
> 

Sure, but:

* I've heard of several cases of company lawyers looking at the GPL and
  coming up with some pretty surreal[1] interpretations of it.  I'm sure
  that Sun has some lawyers who understand the GPL quite well, but
  that isn't going to be true of any random company.  (Remember, 20% of all
  lawyers graduated in the bottom fifth of their law school class.)

* RMS is not a lawyer (RMSINAL?), but his knowledge of the law surrounding
  the GPL is extremely impressive.  And in my experience, he will promptly
  and carefully respond to pretty much any question ---  as long as it isn't
  "can I get around the GPL if I do X?", of course. :-)

-JT


[1] Here I'm using "surreal" as a polite term for "stupidly,
    obviously, blindingly wrong".