From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: from smtp2.linuxfoundation.org (smtp2.linux-foundation.org [172.17.192.36]) by mail.linuxfoundation.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id 7C9BA25A for ; Mon, 29 Aug 2016 23:07:52 +0000 (UTC) Received: from smtprelay.hostedemail.com (smtprelay0181.hostedemail.com [216.40.44.181]) by smtp2.linuxfoundation.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id E6FE31DB33 for ; Mon, 29 Aug 2016 23:07:51 +0000 (UTC) Received: from smtprelay.hostedemail.com (10.5.19.251.rfc1918.com [10.5.19.251]) by smtpgrave08.hostedemail.com (Postfix) with ESMTP id D0DD9211C1F for ; Mon, 29 Aug 2016 23:07:49 +0000 (UTC) Date: Mon, 29 Aug 2016 19:07:45 -0400 From: Steven Rostedt To: James Bottomley Message-ID: <20160829190745.415a6545@gandalf.local.home> In-Reply-To: <1472510397.2376.48.camel@HansenPartnership.com> References: <1472403654.2420.29.camel@HansenPartnership.com> <20160829090703.1c063975@gandalf.local.home> <1472486062.2376.26.camel@HansenPartnership.com> <20160829121615.25e5ddce@gandalf.local.home> <1472510397.2376.48.camel@HansenPartnership.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Cc: Linus Torvalds , ksummit-discuss@lists.linuxfoundation.org Subject: Re: [Ksummit-discuss] [CORE TOPIC] Owning your own copyrights in Linux List-Id: List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , On Mon, 29 Aug 2016 15:39:57 -0700 James Bottomley wrote: > Just on this point, one of the problems with companies is that they > sell stuff, go bust or get bought out. Perhaps this will never apply > to Red Hat (although never say never) but many other people have to > bear in mind that the entity they trust to hold the kernel copyrights > today may not be the same entity tomorrow. > I guess the interesting point is what happens to the copyrights if Red Hat goes bust? Who defends it? Now if another company were to buy out Red Hat, I guess the copyrights would then be owned by them. But the code is still under GPLv2, the worse that can happen is that they simply let others use it like BSD licensed code. But as with most of the Linux kernel, my code is interspersed with others code, so any such usage will require permission from all copyright owners. Also, I'm guessing that the new owner should be the one to fight for it. I still feel that Red Hat will be around longer than I am, which makes things easier when I die. Or perhaps a dual ownership may work in such a case. -- Steve