Media Contact: Free Software Foundation
Ravi Khanna <communication@fsf.org>
Phone:+1-617-542-5942
In the last few months, the Santa Cruz Organization Group (SCO) has been sowing confusion and misinformation regarding the validity of the GNU General Public License (GPL) as part of their strategy to extort money from users of the kernel named Linux, which is licensed under FSF's GPL. These seminars and discussions will present the facts about the license from FSF, its creators, who authored the license in 1989. Today, the GNU GPL is the most popular and widely used Free Software copyright license.
The seminars will provide detailed study and analysis of the GPL, review GPL enforcement cases handled by FSF's GPL Compliance Laboratory, and consider legal ethics in Free Software Licensing. Daniel Ravicher, Senior Counsel to FSF, and Bradley M. Kuhn, Executive Director of FSF, will lead the seminars.
The first seminar, "Detailed Study and Analysis of GPL and LGPL", held on January 20, 2004, will give a section-by-section explanation of the GPL, and will educate lawyers, software developers, managers and business people on how to use the GPL (and GPL'd software) successfully in new Free Software businesses and in existing, successful enterprises.
The second seminar, "GPL Compliance Case Studies and Legal Ethics in Free Software Licensing" held on January 21, 2004, will present the details of a few different GPL compliance cases handled by FSF's GPL Compliance Laboratory. Each case offers unique insights into problems that arise when the terms of the GPL are not properly followed, and how diplomatic negotiation between the violator and the copyright holder can yield positive results for both parties. This seminar also includes a unit on the ethical considerations for attorneys who want to represent clients that make, use, or sell Free Software products.
FSF will also host "SCO Without Fear", a series of two lunchtime conversations with Professor Eben Moglen, who serves on FSF's Board and as its General Counsel. He will discuss the SCO v. IBM lawsuit and SCO's attacks on Free Software, and their implications for the development and use of Free Software. Some of Prof. Moglen's earlier writings on the SCO v. IBM lawsuit can be found at http://www.fsf.org/philosophy/sco/sco.html. These conversations will also be held on January 20-21, 2004 at Columbia University in New York.
More details about these events are available at http://www.fsf.org/licenses/NYC_Seminars_Jan2004.html.
The Free Software Foundation, founded in 1985, is dedicated to promoting computer users' right to use, study, copy, modify, and redistribute computer programs. The FSF promotes the development and use of Free (as in freedom) Software - particularly the GNU operating system and its GNU/Linux variants - and Free Documentation for Free Software. The FSF also helps to spread awareness of the ethical and political issues of freedom in the use of software. Their web site, located at http://www.fsf.org, is an important source of information about GNU/Linux. They are headquartered in Boston, MA, USA.
Eben Moglen is Professor of Law and Legal History at the Columbia Law School, where he has taught since 1987. He clerked for Judge Edward Weinfeld of the United State District Court for the Southern District of New York and for Justice Thurgood Marshall of the United States Supreme Court. Before and during law school he was a designer and implementer of advanced computer programming languages at IBM's Santa Teresa Laboratory and Thomas J. Watson Research Center. His principal areas of interest are Anglo American legal history, constitutional law, computers and free expression, and intellectual property. Since 1993, he has served as pro bono General Counsel for the Foundation and has served on its board since July 2000.
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Updated: $Date: 2004/01/02 19:25:22 $ $Author: bkuhn $