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1. Free Software Foundation (fsf@hostux.social)'s status on Saturday, 27-Jan-2024 12:14:46 JST Free Software Foundation

   Assigning your copyright to the FSF helps defend the GPL and keep software free. Thanks to Axel Stenkil Forsman, Huan Thieu Nguyen, Jinyi Xian, and waffl3x for assigning their copyright to the FSF! #GNU #Emacs #GCC Learn more at https://u.fsf.org/3ht #CopyrightAssignments

   • Alfred M. Szmidt (amszmidt@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 03-Feb-2024 01:52:59 JST Alfred M. Szmidt

     in reply to

     • Omar Antolín

     @oantolin @fsf They have, several times over the decades.

   • Omar Antolín (oantolin@mathstodon.xyz)'s status on Saturday, 03-Feb-2024 01:53:06 JST Omar Antolín

     in reply to

     @fsf "Assigning your copyright to the FSF helps defend the GPL and keep software free." Is this true in the sense that it has actually helped in the past or is it only true in the theoretical sense that it might help in the future? Note that I am not at all against copyright assignment to the FSF and indeed have already done it myself for some Emacs packages I contributed to the GNU ELPA repository! I just want to know, out of curiosity, if the theoretical benefits of copyright assignment have already been realized.

   • Alfred M. Szmidt (amszmidt@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 03-Feb-2024 01:53:09 JST Alfred M. Szmidt

     in reply to

     • Omar Antolín

     @oantolin @fsf A few, most of these things never end up in court since lawyers know what is at stake. The Objective-C addition in GCC was one of those cases. GNU readline and GNU CLISP is another that is sorta famous.

     The Copyright Assignment is a tool to minimise damage from those who want to harm free software, it is a small hurdle that has a proven record of working well in defusing sticky situations, plus ... _you_ don't need to enforce the GNU GPL or such, which is the real benefit.

   • Omar Antolín (oantolin@mathstodon.xyz)'s status on Saturday, 03-Feb-2024 01:53:16 JST Omar Antolín

     in reply to

     • Alfred M. Szmidt

     @amszmidt @fsf Good to know! Do you happen to know of any specific example?

     Free Software Foundation repeated this.