[opensource-dev] Draft update to the Contribution Agreement

[Henri Beauchamp]

On Mon, 07 Oct 2013 12:34:45 -0400, Oz Linden (Scott Lawrence) wrote:

> As most of you probably know, Linden Lab acquired Desura^(TM), a digital 
> distribution service for PC gamers.
> 
> The code for the Desura client is open source, managed as the Desurium 
> project on github <https://github.com/desura/Desurium>.  The Desurium 
> project used a different open source licenses (GPLv3) than we use for 
> the Second Life Viewer project, and had its own Contribution Agreement.
> 
> After some discussion with both Second Life and Desurium contributors, 
> Linden Lab has produced a draft of a new Contributor License Agreement 
> <http://lecs.opensource.secondlife.com/draft-contribution-agreement-2013-10-04.pdf> 
> that we would like to use for both projects in the future.  This email 
> is an invitation to contributors and potential contributors to discuss 
> that draft here.

This CA, just like the previous one, violates the contributors' right
to privacy by requesting the contributor's snail mail address and phone
number (!?!?!) and as such, is illegal in France (law "Informatique et
Liberté": http://www.cnil.fr/fileadmin/documents/en/Act78-17VA.pdf - See
chapter II, article 6, paragraph 3).
Note that such info is not only excessive for the purpose (in case of a
legal dispute, an US judge can get my private address from the French
justice, based on my IP address which my ISP will be legally tied to
disclose on a judge's demand), but it is also unreliable and thus,
perfectly useless (what about persons who move or simply change their
ISP and thus their phone number ?).

I will not sign such a CA... unless Linden Lab's employees all provide
me with their own snail mail address and private phone numbers, LOL !!!

Henri.