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  • Removal of copyright years

    From Peter Wienemann@21:1/5 to All on Thu Feb 6 20:20:01 2025
    Dear copyright experts,

    recently the upstream authors of one of the packages I (co-)maintain
    adjusted the copyright statements of the project on the occasion of its integration into the High Performance Software Foundation.

    As part of this change copyright years were removed from the copyright
    notice (see [0]). According to [1] this happened because the upstream
    authors "got tired of updating those years and it matches the LF recommendation" (where "LF recommendation" is a link to [2]).

    I wonder what are the implications of this removal on the corresponding
    Debian package [3] and its copyright file.

    Best regards

    Peter

    [0] https://gitlab.com/charliecloud/main/-/commit/a1fe5575bb6f0b07b4722422c204ffd7e0b5191c
    [1] https://gitlab.com/charliecloud/main/-/issues/1954
    [2] https://www.linuxfoundation.org/blog/blog/copyright-notices-in-open-source-software-projects
    [3] https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/charliecloud

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  • From Soren Stoutner@21:1/5 to Debian Legal Mailinglist on Thu Feb 6 12:25:24 2025
    Copy: [email protected] (Peter Wienemann)

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    On Thursday, February 6, 2025 12:12:44 PM MST Peter Wienemann wrote:
    Dear copyright experts,

    recently the upstream authors of one of the packages I (co-)maintain
    adjusted the copyright statements of the project on the occasion of its integration into the High Performance Software Foundation.

    As part of this change copyright years were removed from the copyright
    notice (see [0]). According to [1] this happened because the upstream
    authors "got tired of updating those years and it matches the LF recommendation" (where "LF recommendation" is a link to [2]).

    I wonder what are the implications of this removal on the corresponding Debian package [3] and its copyright file.

    I personally dislike this attitude, and I don’t consider the Linux Foundation’s advise to be
    optimal in this regard.

    However, the core of the question from a Debian perspective is what we should do about it
    in debian/copyright. Options are:

    1. Reproduce the upstream copyright as written (without any years).
    2. Add the year of the last commit to their copyright statement (as it is certain that at least
    one file was modified in that year).
    3. Go on a detective hunt to determine the range of all the copyright years. This could be
    as simple as looking at the year of the first commit and the year of the last commit and
    producing a range, or as complex as looking at all the intermediate years to document any
    gaps.

    I would personally go with 2 or 3. In my opinion, no copyright statement is complete
    without a year range, because this tells you when the copyright would be expected to
    expire. Number 2 tells you when the copyright on the totality of the files expires. Number
    3 tells you the range of years when the copyright expires on parts of the contained work.
    It is left to the user to determine when copyright expires for a particular file if they need to
    know that information.

    --
    Soren Stoutner
    [email protected]

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    <body><p style="margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0;margin-left:0;margin-right:0;">On Thursday, February 6, 2025 12:12:44 PM MST Peter Wienemann wrote:</p>
    <p style="margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0;margin-left:0;margin-right:0;">&gt; Dear copyright experts,</p>
    <p style="margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0;margin-left:0;margin-right:0;">&gt; </p> <p style="margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0;margin-left:0;margin-right:0;">&gt; recently the upstream authors of one of the packages I (co-)maintain</p>
    <p style="margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0;margin-left:0;margin-right:0;">&gt; adjusted the copyright statements of the project on the occasion of its</p>
    <p style="margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0;margin-left:0;margin-right:0;">&gt; integration into the High Performance Software Foundation
  • From Ben Ramsey@21:1/5 to All on Fri Feb 7 01:10:01 2025
    On Feb 6, 2025, at 13:25, Soren Stoutner <[email protected]> wrote:

    In my opinion, no copyright statement is complete without a year range, because this tells you when the copyright would be expected to expire. Number 2 tells you when the copyright on the totality of the files expires. Number 3 tells you the range of
    years when the copyright expires on parts of the contained work. It is left to the user to determine when copyright expires for a particular file if they need to know that information.


    The minimum standard for copyright term in the Berne Convention is life of the author plus 50 years. Of the 195 countries in the world, 181 are parties to the Berne Convention. Some countries go well beyond the minimum; in the US, it’s 70 years after
    the author’s death.

    Berne also introduced the concept that authors receive copyright protection the moment the work is “fixed,” and there’s no need to register for copyright or even put a copyright notice on the work.

    I don’t think having the year(s) listed matters anymore. What matters is the year of death of the author. (A morbid thought, I know.)

    Cheers,
    Ben



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  • From Soren Stoutner@21:1/5 to Debian Legal Mailinglist on Thu Feb 6 18:12:32 2025
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    On Thursday, February 6, 2025 5:08:06 PM MST Ben Ramsey wrote:
    On Feb 6, 2025, at 13:25, Soren Stoutner <[email protected]> wrote:

    In my opinion, no copyright statement is complete without a year range, because this tells you when the copyright would be expected to expire. Number 2 tells you when the copyright on the totality of the files expires.
    Number 3 tells you the range of years when the copyright expires on parts of the contained work. It is left to the user to determine when copyright expires for a particular file if they need to know that information.
    The minimum standard for copyright term in the Berne Convention is life of the
    author plus 50 years. Of the 195 countries in the world, 181 are parties to the Berne Convention. Some countries go well beyond the minimum; in the US, it’s 70 years after the author’s death.

    Berne also introduced the concept that authors receive copyright protection the moment the work is “fixed,” and there’s no need to register for copyright
    or even put a copyright notice on the work.

    I don’t think having the year(s) listed matters anymore. What matters is the
    year of death of the author. (A morbid thought, I know.)

    You make a good point. Although I will probably still prefer to include copyright years on
    projects where I am upstream, I won’t feel so strongly against those who do otherwise.

    --
    Soren Stoutner
    [email protected]

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    <body><p style="margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0;margin-left:0;margin-right:0;">On Thursday, February 6, 2025 5:08:06 PM MST Ben Ramsey wrote:</p>
    <p style="margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0;margin-left:0;margin-right:0;">&gt; &gt; On Feb 6, 2025, at 13:25, Soren Stoutner &lt;[email protected]&gt; wrote:</p>
    <p style="margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0;margin-left:0;margin-right:0;">&gt; &gt; </p>
    <p style="margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0;margin-left:0;margin-right:0;">&gt; &gt; In my opinion, no copyright statement is complete without a year range,</p>
    <p style="margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0;margin-left:0;margin-right:0;">&gt; &gt; because this tells you when the copyright would be expected to expire. </p>
    <p style="margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0;margin-left:0;margin-right
  • From Florian Weimer@21:1/5 to All on Sun Feb 9 22:10:01 2025
    * Soren Stoutner:

    recently the upstream authors of one of the packages I (co-)maintain
    adjusted the copyright statements of the project on the occasion of its
    integration into the High Performance Software Foundation.

    As part of this change copyright years were removed from the copyright
    notice (see [0]). According to [1] this happened because the upstream
    authors "got tired of updating those years and it matches the LF
    recommendation" (where "LF recommendation" is a link to [2]).

    I personally dislike this attitude, and I don’t consider the Linux Foundation’s advise to be optimal in this regard.

    The LF recommendations actually say this (quite unsurprisingly):

    | Don’t change someone else’s copyright notice without their permission
    |
    | You should not change or remove someone else’s copyright notice
    | unless they have expressly (in writing) permitted you to do so. This
    | includes third parties’ notices in pre-existing code.

    <https://www.linuxfoundation.org/blog/blog/copyright-notices-in-open-source-software-projects>

    It's hard to make a generic statement what constitutes “someone else's copyright notice”. The case here is somewhat borderline. But as far
    as I can see, the project only changed their own Copyright lines, and
    not the lines on imported files.

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