Copyleft-next should not do unilateral disarmament via the sunset clause

Richard Fontana fontana at sharpeleven.org
Mon Jul 7 15:02:21 UTC 2025


On Sun, Jul 6, 2025 at 8:41 PM Richard Fontana <fontana at sharpeleven.org> wrote:
>
> On Sun, Jul 6, 2025 at 8:10 PM Bradley M. Kuhn <bkuhn at ebb.org> wrote:
> >
> > I think at one point I supported the sunset clause … in an effort to be
> > realistic about how long software is actually useful without changes or
> > improvements (which of course would be newly copyrightable).
> >
> > We should also consider the question of when copyleft contractual obligations
> > should sunset (and if they should).
> >
> > These are complex questions, but I think starting from first principles,
> > cutting the existing sunset clause and design from scratch may make more
> > sense.
>
> I agree.
>
> > I'm curious what Fontana thinks since he added it in:
> >
> > commit c2569e09be25540028979bf883d2f3a0c9d45d6f
> > Author: Richard Fontana <fontana at sharpeleven.org>
> > Date:   Feb 19 2013
> >
> >     Add 'Copyleft Sunset' provision.
> >
> >     See mailing list thread "Limited-term copyleft" beginning at
> >     https://lists.fedorahosted.org/pipermail/copyleft-next/2013-February/000499.html
> >
> > Sadly that URL fails so I wonder if folks could find a better link to that
> > thread on the old list?
>
> Not sure but I suspect this may be related to the datacenter migration
> that Fedora has been undergoing recently.

The thread can be read via Hyperkitty at:
https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/copyleft-next@lists.fedorahosted.org/thread/QE3LAPLGBIKCACEOKLMKAW7FCLS2USKZ/


More information about the next mailing list