To jery_wang2002

Just remember: Linux is just a kernel...and what is called a "Linux distro" is not equal with "a program".

Get the facts right before you go on the highhorse and start to preach.

When I first started selling mepis on my website I did it the legal way. I went to mepis.org to find out If I can sell it. It was under GPL and I was able to sell it. And the website mepis.org wrote the Mepis name and Logo is TM and you can't sell it without permission. And mepis.org at that time around Feb of 2005 has a email that you can apply for permission to use the Mepis name and Logo. Here is how the permission list from mepis.org.

1. Your name and address.

2. Your Phone and Email.

3. Where you plan to sell it.

4. I m requesting to use the MEPIS name and logo for
the purpose of selling CDs.

5. I agree to display this statement on each CD
containing MEPIS Linux and prominently on any web
pages or printed collateral related to your sale of
MEPIS Linux CDs: "Please support MEPIS Linux by
registering your copy at: http://www.mepis.org." On
web pages, the link to MEPIS must be active.

6. I will clearly label each CD regarding the version
of MEPIS Linux it contains.

7. That I will not imply that you are an official
representative of MEPIS LLC and that you will not make
misleading statements about your relationship with
MEPIS and MEPIS Linux.

8. That I will hold MEPIS LLC and MEPIS Linux harmless
for any problems arising out of your sale of MEPIS
CDs.

9. That if I violate the terms of this agreement, I
will immediately stop using the MEPIS name and logo if
asked to do so.


So I applied and have the right to use the logo and name.
And all of sudden, a company call technalign.com said they are the only allowed commercial reseller said NO, You were NEVER allowed to use Mepis name and Logo. And wanted me to signup as a reseller for them and giving me 50% off (https://secure.heavyindustrial.com/o...alog/index.php). And I was thinking, what about the OPENOFFICE and GIMP that Mepis put with the CD they are selling? OPENOFFICE and GIMP don't get pay from mepis and why is that mepis claim it is GNU GPL?? But charges $40.00 for it?? And you can't sell it for a profit?? I think they just trying to get people to do free coding and said it is GNU GPL so people around the world will help them to code for free. Then suddenly they change it to TM and claims the copyright. This is worst then MS, because at least MS paid their programmers. Mephis should be a shame!!!

Maybe they took the reselling rights from you because you didn't know the name of the distro you were selling.

Ah... goody, another troll... I will have fun... I was starting to get bored.

I was using the correct name. Followed everything listed on mepis.org. And suddenly they just stop giving the rights to resell without tell anyone first. one day out of the blue I got a warning from technalign.com saying If I keep selling simplymepis, They will sent me to court. So I was confused, because I thought I got the rights from mepis.org around Feb of 2005. Then I call technalign.com to find out more, and was told from technalign.com that mepis.org never gave permisson to anyone to use their logo. I don't know if technalign.com was lying to me or Warren Woodford was not telling technalign.com about "applying for permission to Mepis name and Logo" email link on the mepis.org website around Feb of 2005 for anyone to apply. If Warren Woodford wanted to stop people from using Mepis name and logo, he should at least email eveyone who applied for permission. Not just use another commerical company to send warning letters to everyone even the ones with permission in the first place.

After talking with technalign.com I was more confused about if technalign.com telling me the truth. Then I call mepis.org at 1-304-288-0993 and ask about what is the deal about permission to use their name and logo. mepis said it is not the case anymore, now only technaglign.com is their reseller now and they stop giving the rights to use mepis name and logo two months ago. Also said, we have rents to pay too. And when I ask why didn't you email the ones who applied for the permission about this, mepis just said, we dont' knwo who is selling. Mepis is not GPL anymore!

That's a strange thing to say because Mepis is a trademark and a trademark from what I know has nothing to do with a software license (which GPL is).

Mepis distro is a collection of programs and it never was GPL since GPL applies to individual packages in the distro and not to a colllection of programs (besides in that program collection there were programs that were not GPL from the beginning like Java, Acrobat Reader some Mepis utilities, Nvidia and ATI drivers and so on).

I guess if they gave you the permission to use Mepis name that could also take the permission away but that doesn't have anything to do with GPL. And I don't know why you accuse them of exploiting programers and being worse than Microsoft when you (as far as I can tell) are not a programmer that contributed to Mepis and the GPL programs that Mepis uses are available for free for everybody so puting them on a CD doesn't exploit anyone.

Well.... you can sell Ubuntu or something else, you don't need to sell Mepis if you don't like the deal.

Mepis is a derivative work that includes many GPL-ed components. GPL requires that you make available the derivative work without imposing additional restrictions, be they patent, trademark, contract or copyright. It says that if these restrictions prevent you from freely distributing the work, you can't distribute it at all.

So there's a gray area. It appears that Warren can restrict the name Mepis insofar as this restriction doesn't interfere with your right to copy the software. So I think that he is within his rights to enjoin you from advertising your distro as Mepis. However, the disk contains many occurrences of the name "Mepis" and I think it could be argued that duplicating those occurrences was an essential step in copying the collected work, and therefore permitted under GPL.

Similarly, It may be argued that it is impractical to dissect Mepis as a whole into GPL-ed and non-GPL-ed components, so restricting the use of the non-open-source components would be an encumbrance on distributing the GPL-ed component, hence proscribed by GPL.

Not at all, if you want the GPL code that's freely available and you can distribute it. It's available in the form of Debian distribution.

No, no and no. Please read the discussion above to understand what "derivative work" means in the context of GPL. Mepis is a collection of packages, not a "derivative work" the packages that are GPL are still GPL and there is no restriction to what you can do with that code from Mepis. Mepis own packages and other packages that are not GPL have their own license and you have to respect those licenses. Mepis installer is not a derivative work it's not based on the work of anyone else it's code written only by Warren (therefore not "derivative work") and he can decide to do whatever he wants with it.

Mepis is a collected work, no question. I think that makes it a derivative work, but IANAL, and neither are you. It may also contain modified GPL-ed components; I have no reasonable way to know. The license document on the Mepis CD is about as clear as mud. I do not believe that a reasonable person can dissect Mepis into separate components, ergo separating the components is an impediment to distribution of the GPL-ed ones.

I am a big fan of Mepis but I find the licensing issues murky, notwithstanding proclamations to the contrary.

I'm sorry but you are in a big confusion. GPL talks about specific programs not about CDs. The programs come with the licenses them come with, there's no such thing as collective GPL or alike. Thinks are pretty clear in my view, I'm sorry you don't see that. Mepis doesn't restrict any GPL rights, if you want the code from GPL programs you can get it, heck, you don't even have to ask Mepis, I can send it to you.

You don't need to disect you just have to ask for GPL code and you'll get it? Where the heck did you read in GPL about "dissection"? There's absolutely no impediment to distribution of GPL-ed code, ask for it, you'll get it.

The idea of GPL is to be able to get the code and its modification. You can get that. What you cannot get is: Mepis installer which is not "derivative work" (you don't need to be a lawyer to get that, just look into the dictionary for "derivative" you'll see that in order to have a "derivate" you need something to derive that from, I challange you or anyone else to say what is Mepis installer derived from).

There's no gray area, it's pretty clear. You want the GPLed code you can get it, you want to use Mepis name you have to ask permision from Mepis company, you need to use Mepis tools -- the same. "Desection" or extracting the GPL code from Mepis CD is a silly non-issue, that's not how you are supposed to go about it, just ask for the GPL code.

Things are not murky just because you don't understand them.

The GPL says: `The "Program", below, refers to any such program or work, and a "work based on the Program" means either the Program or any derivative work under copyright law'

The US Copyright Office states as an example of a derivative work, "Book of maps (based on public domain maps with some new maps)"

My legal theory, which I believe is sufficiently well founded so as not to deserve your insults, is that Mepis is a copyrightable work in its own right. It is a "distro" not jut a palette of tools. Since it is copyrightable and includes GPL-ed software, it is a derivative work of that GPL-ed software. And of the non-GPL-ed software as well. To the extent that the non-GPL-ed software (belonging to Mepis or to Sun or to Adobe or whomever), if it places additional constraints on the distribution of Mepis, is inconsistent with the GPL-ed components.

What constraints? Please read GPL and say what rights are you missing.

Here are (some of) the rights that might be in question:

1. The right to distribute the CD because it contains the trademarked name Mepis.

2. The right to distribute meauto, flash, quicktime, adobe reader, and other non-free software which is an integral part of Mepis.

In short, my position is that Mepis itself is a derivative work of the GPL software that it contains, but itself does not appear to be available under GPL.

Your position, as I understand it, is one of these, but I'm not sure which:

(a) Mepis is merely a routine assembly of other works, not copyrightable in itself, and hence not a derivative work.

(b) The GPL permits inclusion of GPL-ed software in other non-GPL works, provided they are not "programs."

(c) Mepis *is* available under GPL.

I never said that Mepis is available under GPL. Man, with people like you who twist words Microsft will not have big problem to scare people away from Linux and GPL. One more post of yours and I will start to think that GPL is indeed a cancer.

I think it's a matter of trademark not license here. You are not allowed to use the name Mepis if you don't get permision from Mepis and that's pretty logical.

You never had this right in order to lose it. Again I find pretty silly to claim that flash, quicktime and all those things are derivate work from Linux packages.

Every package has it's own license, why do you think they whould need a collective license and moreover why would that collective license include "meauto, flash, quicktime, adobe reader, and other non-free software". That's a little bit extremist interpretation of GPL -- don't listen to me becaue I'm biased asked anyone else that knows a little bit about laws.

Please let me know what program is for example Flash derived from. If you can answer that that you'll be able to ask that to be released as GPL.

More ad hominem statements; no answers.

A derivative work can be derived from more than one prior work; in this event the licensing requirements for all prior works must be met. I believe that it is unclear that the licensing requirements for several material components - the GPL-ed ones in particular - are met in Mepis.

Beat me up if you must, but such arguments clarify nothing. Instead why don't you explain why you think Mepis is not a derivative work, and why it is exempt from GPL. I cited the GPL and the US Copyright Office and gave my arguments. Why don't you rebut my arguments rather than badgering me?

I think I will go into studying laws more that I'd like to, but here it goes....

Go to the source:
http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html (it was posted before in the same thread)
To me that's the case of programs on the Mepis CD. You cannot contaminate a license of a program: Acrobat Reader, Flash, Java, Mepis Center with the GPL since they are separate programs on their own rights. Mind the "parts of a single program" sintax. There's no "one" Mepis program, there's no "one" Linux program (except for the kernel) there are more programs each one with its own license.

As for the GPL programs none of the freedoms are broken. You can get them and distribute them as you wish. You don't get the GPL rights on the non-GPL programs because... yeah they are not GPL and they don't have to be according to GNU FAQ.