HP Forum Archive 15

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Free42 for sale at eBay? Message #1 Posted by Gerson W. Barbosa on 12 Aug 2005, 8:15 p.m. http://cgi.ebay.com/HP-42S-calculator_W0QQitemZ7175779549QQcategoryZ182QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

Re: Free42 for sale at eBay? Message #2 Posted by Howard Owen on 12 Aug 2005, 8:27 p.m., in response to message #1 by Gerson W. Barbosa Interesting. It's not against the GPL to charge for distributing software. The source needs to come with, or be otherwise accessible from the distributed package. There's not much "value-add" that I can see in that offer, however. And with the software's name prominently displayed, I doubt he gets any bids.

Re: Free42 for sale at eBay? Message #3 Posted by Gerson W. Barbosa on 12 Aug 2005, 9:06 p.m., in response to message #2 by Howard Owen We could suggest the seller to add a link to Free42 so that potential buyers have a little more information about 'his' product... :-)

Re: However Message #4 Posted by Mike on 13 Aug 2005, 3:43 p.m., in response to message #2 by Howard Owen It is against eBay rules, if there is any shareware aspect to this calculator. I mean if he has any features that require a fee to access, it's an illegal auction.

Re: However Message #5 Posted by Howard Owen on 13 Aug 2005, 4:22 p.m., in response to message #4 by Mike That's interesting, I didn't know that. GPL software isn't shareware, its free (like in freedom) software. The license states that you can charge for distribution of GPLd software if you like. That's what all the major Linux vendors do, for example. Is that different from selling your software for a fee, where "selling" means "selling the media and a right to use license?" I don't know. Come to think, you can buy plain proprietary software on eBay. It even has a rather extensive category. So the difference must be the delayed payment in shareware. You "try before you buy" then eBay doesn't get a cut when you eventually pay. I'll bet that's it. So then the GPL software wouldn't differ from proprietary in that respect, since all the money is transferred up front where eBay can tax it.

Re: Free42 for sale at eBay? Message #6 Posted by Gerson W. Barbosa on 14 Aug 2005, 5:57 p.m., in response to message #2 by Howard Owen Quote: ... I doubt he gets any bids. I doubted it too but he's got two bids so far... Five hours to end and the price has reached 12 Euro.

Re: Free42 for sale at eBay? Message #7 Posted by Namir on 14 Aug 2005, 3:24 p.m., in response to message #1 by Gerson W. Barbosa I wrote Thomas Okken about this auction and provided him with the seller's email address. Namir

Re: Free42 for sale at eBay? Message #8 Posted by Thomas Okken on 15 Aug 2005, 2:10 p.m., in response to message #7 by Namir I don't think this auction is against eBay's rules -- Free42 is not shareware; there are no optional features that require extra payment to unlock etc. As long as the seller is selling a version that has my copyright, my web site URL, and my email address, I don't see anything wrong with this... Woe to the suckers who don't Google "Free42" before making a bid. Hmmm, maybe I should contact the winning bidder and ask them if the software they receive has been tampered with.

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