Copyright assignments and the MAINTAINERS file

[Phil Edwards]

On Fri, Feb 13, 2004 at 11:44:09AM -0800, Geoff Keating wrote:
> 
> That's actually a significant issue; I know there are some people
> formerly at Cygnus/Red Hat who were covered only by their employer
> assignment, who are no longer working there, and who are still listed
> in MAINTAINERS.

That's a very good point.

> Often these people are listed only by their corporate e-mail address,
> which is of course not valid, and so they are no longer contactable.

I can think of two methods of handling this:

1)  Try to find recent emails and/or commit messages from the people.  Have
    them update their email in MAINTAINERS.  Tell them that they must submit
    new (personal) paperwork before they can check any more code in.

Safer but stricter, working on the assumption that people would have kept
their records up to date if they had wanted to keep contributing (feel free to
argue the validity of the assumption *grin*):

2)  Assume they are no longer submitting code or working on the project.
    Kill[*] the login account at once, remove their entry from MAINTAINERS.
    People who have left the project won't complain.  People who still want to
    contribute will find their accounts not working and complain, at which
    point we tell them to update their assignment before getting the account
    re-enabled.

[*]  Or suspend with a special note saying why, etc.

-- 
America may be unique in being a country which has leapt
from barbarism to decadence without touching civilization.
  - John O'Hara