[DECtalk] Permissions, Rights, etc. (was Re: Report of a successful use of dectalk with graphical Linux.)

[Jayson Smith]

Hi,

This message is directed at Josh. Please, for the love of all that is 
good and holy, stop bothering DECtalk developers about this. If I 
understand my DECtalk history and facts correctly, the developers who 
are still active in the DECtalk community do not, in fact, own the 
copyright to the code. This means they do not have the right to give 
anyone permission to use the code. Even if they say they don't care what 
we do with it, that statement isn't worth a hill of beans because they 
do not have the right to make that decision. Only the current copyright 
holder or his/her/their authorized representative has the right to make 
that decision.

Also, as others have stated, an audio recording is not going to cut it 
in a legal context. You need an official document signed by the 
copyright holder. Not that I'm a lawyer or anything, but while some 
people might be willing to work with someone just saying they don't care 
what we do with this code, companies and organizations that might want 
to include DECtalk in their own software distributions (think screen 
readers, Linux distributions, etc) have to be absolutely sure, beyond a 
doubt, that they have the legal right to do so. Just an "I don't care" 
is nowhere near enough to give these companies/organizations the 
assurance they need that the code is free and clear from a legal 
perspective.

If you wish to continue this discussion with others, please do so 
off-list. I have nothing further to say on this matter, as I've said all 
I know to say.

For everyone else, I'm sorry this has happened again.

Jayson

On 2/22/2023 7:10 PM, Kyle via Dectalk wrote:
> A recorded conversation is not legally binding for the purposes of 
> DECTalk, since the LICENSE file states that only a written valid 
> license from Fonix or an authorized sublicenser authorizes me or 
> anyone else to even possess this code. I'm certain that a copy of the 
> GPL or any other open source license signed off by a former Fonix 
> employee or by an original author of the code who holds the most 
> recent copyright would suffice, but it would in fact need to be 
> documented that such a written license came from a person authorized 
> to license the code in such a way.
>
> ~Kyle
>
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