Re: Loading a package applies automatically to future sessions?

[Stephen Berman]

On Sat, 03 Feb 2018 00:12:12 +0100 Stephen Berman <address@hidden> wrote:

> On Fri, 02 Feb 2018 17:53:53 -0500 Richard Stallman <address@hidden> wrote:
>
>> [[[ To any NSA and FBI agents reading my email: please consider    ]]]
>> [[[ whether defending the US Constitution against all enemies,     ]]]
>> [[[ foreign or domestic, requires you to follow Snowden's example. ]]]
>>
>>   > I don't know of an online resource with such details, but maybe it's
>>   > somewhere in the FSF website.
>>
>> I think we should post an explanation of this.
>>
>> It appears that we don't have one on gnu.org.  Would you like to check
>> fsf.org?
>
> I probably cannot make a systematic check any time soon, but if I do
> find the time, or happen to notice a relevant page by chance, I'll be
> sure to point it out.

I don't have the time to manually look through every page of the FSF
website but I did enter "assign" in the site's search form; it returned
55 hits, most of which are lists of new copyright assigners.  But the
following pages have some information about what copyright assignment
means:

https://www.fsf.org/licensing/index_html
 FSF Licensing & Compliance Team
 by Joshua Gay — published Mar 13, 2013 — last modified Aug 11, 2017 03:13 PM
 [...]
 Copyright & Compliance
 The Free Software Foundation holds the copyright to many GNU packages,
 such as GCC and EMACS. When hackers contribute to these projects, we
 ask that they assign their copyright to enable us to enforce the
 license. For questions about assigning to the FSF, please contact us at
 address@hidden

https://www.fsf.org/blogs/rms/assigning-copyright
 When a company asks for your copyright
 by Richard Stallman — published Sep 29, 2010 — last modified Nov 05, 2010 
09:46 AM 
 [...]
 The company will probably invite you to assign or license your
 copyright to the company. That in itself is not inherently bad; for
 instance, many GNU software developers have assigned copyrights to the
 FSF. However, the FSF never sells exceptions, and its assignment
 contracts include a commitment to distribute the contributor's code
 only with source and only permitting redistribution.

https://www.fsf.org/licensing/assignunisrule.html
 Assignment University
 by jacobson — published Sep 19, 2006 — last modified Jul 29, 2013 02:55 PM 
 [...]
 Although the FSF does not require the assignment of copyright on new
 GNU project programs, on existing programs where it already holds
 copyright, the FSF does collect assignments and register copyrights.
 [...]
 some reasons why a university might like to assign copyright to the FSF:
 -> University assignment of code allows the university freedom from the
 burden of protecting the work created by the developers at the
 university. The FSF accepts copyright so that it can do its enforcement
 work.
 [...]

https://www.fsf.org/licensing/20050325novalis.html
 The Basics
 by novalis — published Mar 25, 2005 — last modified Mar 12, 2010 10:06 AM 
 [...]
 5. You can also assign your copyright. By way of analogy, licensing
 software to someone is like inviting them to visit your house;
 assigning copyright to someone is like selling them your house.
 a. You might want to assign your copyright to someone else if they
 promise to do the work of enforcing the license, or they otherwise
 won't take your patches.

Steve Berman