coordinated compliance efforts addresses the issues of this thread

[Vic]

> It seems you don't understand how reality works.

See, now you're just getting offensive.

You've said something that is demonstrably factually incorrect about the
GPL. Let's just leav it like that, shall we?

> One _must_ not cross the street when the red light is on,

Utter rubbish.

> Yes, companies must pass the same rights to the recipient, but then
> often don't. It happens, really.

If they fail to do so, they are not compliant with the terms under which
they are distributing. That's no different whatsoever from me making hooky
copies of "Pirates of the Caribbean" and selling it on at car boot sales.
It's simply a case of copying without a licence so to do.

Trying to infer somethnig about the GLP from that is a fool's errand; it
says nothing whatosever because it is simply unlawful copying.

The GPL, however, has one more thing to say: should the above occur, the
recipient *still* gets all his GPL rights directly from the original
licensor, despite the distributor not being in compliance. This is section
6 of GPLv2, section 10 of GPLv3. So even in your scenario, the end-user
*still* receives those rights from the original licensor, despite the
middle-man unlawfully trying to prevent that happening.

> I don't give the end users anything

Yes you do. Read the sections I've just highlighted. Your understanding is
simply incorrect.

> I give permission to the software
> users, and what they do is their own problem. They can choose to
> violate the license, and in that case the end users get nothing.

This is factually incorrect.

> The end users receive their rights from the company, not from me.

This is factually incorrect.

> No, I didn't say anything like that

You made a definitive (untrue) statement about the GPL, then said "I'm not
talking about the GPL". You said something exactly like that.

> it's particularily convenient that you didn't quote what I wrote right
> after this

You've said so much, it's tricky to quote all of it. Most of what you've
said is erroneous, and I don't really want to quote it anyway.

>> In the specific case of the GPL, the company might be violating the
>> GPL, so the end user would not see the license, but that's a problem
>> between me, and the company; the licensor, and the licensee.

And that is fundamentally untrue.

> See? The GPL is no exception; the license is still a contract between
> the licensor (me), and the licensee (the company).

No, you've misrepresented the GPL. You do not know whereof yuo speak.

> The end user has another license between the the company (licensor),
> and the end user (licensee). *If* the company chooses to do that.

No. The end-user has a grant of rights directly from the original
licensor. It's in the licence, if you'd like to read it sometime...

> The company might chose to not do that, in which case it will be in
> violation of the license from me, *but* I can choose to not do
> anything about it.

You can indeed. But that does *not* preclude the end-user from getting the
rights grant, just like the licence says they do.

> It's entire up to me what license I choose, and it's entirely up to me
> to decide how to enforce it. There's nothing wrong with choosing a BSD
> license, or a GPL license and not enforce it. It's *my* choice.

It is indeed.

But your not enforcing a GPL licenmce that you have already chosen does
*not* mean that the end-user gets no rights - they do. Those rights are
granted in the licence, and persist as long as that user does not violate
the licence. Someone else violating the licence does *not* mean that all
downstream recipients lost those rights; they keep them.

this is all in the licence. I strongly suggest you read it, rather than
just making it up as you go along.

> It's copyright that gives original authors protection, and makes the
> GPL enforceable.

That's where most of the teeth come from, but not all of them. Contract
law has something to say in many jurisdictions.

> If I chose not to enforce the license, and the end users didn't get
> the license, the end users get nothing, and there's nothing the FSF
> can do about it. It doesn't matter what is written in the GPL.

Errr - have I mentioned just how wrong you are about that?

> A contract is also between two parties, and if the two parties don't
> have a problem, there's no problem.

And if one of them does have a problem - there is a problem.

You persist in claiming that the end-user gets no rights, despite the very
clear plain language in the GPL. Either you're right, and the GPL doesn't
say what the GPL says, or else you're wrong. Can you take a guess as to
whether or not the GPL says what the GPL says?

> It is still correct, because the GPL can only give rights to end users
> *if* I chose to enforce the GPL

Untrue.

> or *if* the company distributed the
> software with that license.

Untrue.

> In the first case, it's entirely up to me, I can make it go away in a
> whim.

You can only choose not to enforce your own rights. You cannot remove
someone else's, however much you seem to want to.

>> The end-user has rights granted him regardless of what any intervening
>> distributor might try to do.
>
> Only if *I* choose to enforce the license.

Wrong.

>> Really - you ought to read the GPL. It says different things to what you
>> claim it says.
>
> What the GPL says is irrelevant. Get it?

What the GPL says is *not* irrelevant. Get it?

> One more time: the end users get their rights from the company

Wrong.

> *if* I choose not to enforce them, the users get nothing

Wrong.

> it doesn't
> matter what the GPL says, because both sides, me (the licensor), and
> the company (the licensee) choose to ignore it. Period.

Wrong.

Really, holding forth about stuff you clearly don't understand and don't
even appear to have read is not doing yuo any favours here.

Now I'm sure you're going to want to have the last word, so I'm going to
let you - I cannot be bothered to explain stuff to someone who doesn't
even read the material he's arguing about. Go off on one to your heart's
content - I shall be ignoring you from here on as you are clearly clueless
about the subjects you espouse.

Vic.