Re: Collapsing copyright year lists to ranges

[Karl Berry]

    Is it now whether the package was published, 

As far as I know, that was always the determining factor wrt actual
copyright law.
    
    as opposed to "each year in which you finished preparing a version
    which was actually released, and which was an ancestor of the
    current version"

Yes, I remember/see that text.  I do not know on what basis rms wrote
it.  But since he himself changed it, I can only conclude that it does
not apply now.  For years now, whenever I have talked about it with rms
(or Donald or anyone else), it is publication years that count.

    This affects the cases where previously private version control was
    made public, so meaning old development versions were thereby
    published.

Well, I can see your idea that if it is "completed years" that count,
rather than "publication years", so that what amounts to retroactive
publication is effective, that older years could get included.

I don't know.  If I ask Donald, I feel pretty sure that he'll just say
"I don't know" -- he wasn't around back then, and anyway, he was just
basing his previous answers on what was written in maintain.texi and his
general knowledge of copyright law, much like you and me.

If I ask rms, I feel even more sure he will say "I have no idea about
something done years ago", and it will take still more effort and lawyer
time to research the issue or even figure out what was meant.

I'll do it if you want, but honestly, it does not seem worthwhile
to me simply for the sake of optimizing the list of old-old years.

Best,
k