Re: Copyright assignment wiki page

[Jim Wilson <wilson at tuliptree dot org>]

FX Coudert wrote:
> Moreover, our contribute page says "the GCC maintainer that is taking 
> care of your contributions" and there is no documentation to 
> maintainers, so that part at least is wrong: maintainers don't know what 
> to do. Or else, I just didn't receive the maintainer welcome package 
> including the appropriate documentation :)

See
    http://www.gnu.org/prep/maintain/
    http://www.gnu.org/prep/standards/

The FSF defines maintainer a bit differently than the gcc project.  In 
the FSF view, the GCC SC is the maintainer of GCC, and no one else. 
When the FSF appoints a maintainer for a package, they usually do point 
the new maintain at appropriate document, but gcc has so many 
sub-maintainers(?) that not all of them get the info they need.  Note 
that these documents assume you have an account at the FSF, which true 
maintainers do, but most gcc sub-maintainers(?) don't.

> More fundamentaly, I think it's a strange pattern when an open-source 
> project makes the path harder for our contributors.

This is unfortunately a problem with the US legal system, not a problem 
with the FSF.

> I'd point out that other GNU (or not) projects have the same form on 
> their website, e.g. 

Other people making mistakes does not give us permission to make the 
same mistake.

By the way, the main reason why the FSF doesn't want the forms up for 
public view is that most people who grab them from there will fill them 
out wrong.  This just creates more work for the FSF.  Hence the FSF 
generally prefers that you just point people at them first, and then the 
FSF will fill out the necessary forms to ensure that they are done right.

Jim