Python 2.0b1 is released!

[Tim Peters]

[John J. Lee]
> Can somebody explain why CNRI still want to keept the copyright if this is
> the case?

This is question #26 (currently the last one) in the CNRI License FAQ:

    http://www.python.org/1.6/license_faq.html

One short sentence in the middle of their answer very directly says CNRI
*will* retain copyright.  The rest of it appears incoherent to me.
Feel-good phrases like "the public good" and "best interests of the Python
community" show up often in CNRI's communications, and AFAIK they've never
explained their motivations, either in public or private, beyond repeating
those (and similar) vagaries.

So let's be generous:  I immodestly believe I have a better understanding of
"the Python community" than CNRI ever will.  And, according to me, almost
everything CNRI did during Guido's 5 years there *was* in the best interests
of our community, however one may wish to (reasonably) define that.  Whether
that's due to Guido or CNRI is open to debate, but at worst CNRI didn't get
in the way too visibly too often, and most (incl., I believe, Guido) would
say CNRI was very often very helpful to Python.  Overall, then, the
community *had* been very happy with CNRI's stewardship.

The community is much more split over whether forcing a new license down its
throat was a good or a bad thing.  At one extreme, it's arguable that it
delayed Python progress for months (and still is), while protecting the
community only against CNRI's *own* threat to nullify the CWI license.  At
the other extreme, it's arguable that CNRI heroically and selflessly
repaired a decade of gross legal neglect, and put Python on solid legal
ground for the first time in its history.  The community won't reach
consensus on this, but it's a safe bet which extreme CNRI views itself
occupying <wink>.

Going forward, it's much muddier.  Let's say CNRI really is trying to act
"in the public interest" (btw, I personally believe that's at least part of
the truth).

Would it be prudent to assign copyright to BeOpen.com, a for-profit company
whose eventual goal will be to maximize shareholder value?  If the community
wouldn't have serious reservations about that on the face of it, they
deserve whatever they get <wink>.  However, we (Guido & his team) retained a
law firm (with our own bucks) to draft legal papers assuring Python's open
source status no matter what happens at BeOpen.com, and once those are
signed there should be no fear that BeOpen.com will somehow turn evil and
screw the community.  *Before* those papers are signed, though, it's a
credible fear (even if unlikely to materialize).

How about assigning copyright to Guido personally?  I believe the community
would overwhelmingly support that, and that's what Guido wants.  But there's
an unmistakable element of paternalism in CNRI's "public good"
pronouncements, and, to be blunt, I *suspect* CNRI's Bob Kahn fears Guido is
still too much of a legal nincompoop to trust with Python's copyright.  To
be terribly blunt, if that's what he does fear, the very mess Python has
just gone through doesn't exactly argue against it.

So I don't expect CNRI to change their mind on this right away.  After the
current mess settles, and both sides cool down, and everyone figures out
that nobody else really had any evil intentions after all, I hope we can
work with CNRI to find a better resolution to the copyright issue.  I think
they really believe they're acting in Python's best interests by keeping it
for themselves now, and I'm not entirely sure I'd disagree with that
*today*.  Down the road, the less involved CNRI becomes with the day-to-day
work of making Python fly, the less credible their stewardship of the
copyright will become.  I expect the community can eventually make a
compelling case even to them that it would be better to assign it to Guido;
or to an independent legal entity created for the purpose (w/ a Board of
Directors drawn from all segments of the community -- the whole bit); or
even to place it in the public domain (my personal favorite, but IANAL).

> Everything else makes at least some kind of sense to me, even the fact
> that some of the lawyers involved think that the new license is GPL
> compatible: this involves not only the meta-legal question of which law
> your license is subject to, but also the meta-meta-legal issue of what you
> are allowed to specify about that.  Hofstadteresque!

Believe me, from the inside of this it's a lot more Kafkaesque <0.1 wink>.

also-helleresque-in-the-catch-22-sense-ly y'rs  - tim