On Wednesday, March 26, 2003, at 08:26 PM, Alan Kay wrote:

> Disney did not at all "acquire" Squeak in any way. We put it on the 
> Squeak.org website (not in any way owned or controlled by Disney) in 
> Sept 1996 while we were still at Apple, and we started using it from 
> that public website when we arrived at Disney a month later. There is 
> no distinction of any kind that exists between the use we made of 
> Squeak while at Disney and the use made by any of the rest of the 
> participants of the Squeak list.

Fair enough, although there would be legal issues, in the absence of an 
agreement to the contrary, whether the work product of Disney 
employees, even research fellows, are Disney property.  Under the 
copyright Act, a work is a work made for hire (owned by the employer) 
if created by an employee within the scope of employment.  Was that the 
case here?

Even if it was Disney product, it would be subject to the viral 
properties, however applicable, of Squeak-L.  The question is whether 
we could modify the license for that content without Disney permission.

>      I spent quite a few hours and days in the first several years 
> explaining to everyone at Disney from Michael Eisner on down -- and 
> especially Disney lawyers -- what the opensource agreement actually 
> meant: the most important part of which was that Disney would likely 
> get greater benefits in the end from allowing our stuff to go into the 
> opensource code because it would likely spread faster and be seen as 
> less threatening if Disney (or any other large company -- like MS and 
> Sun) didn't own it and couldn't control it. After a few years of this, 
> all in the company accepted this argument and were happy to go along 
> with it.

Hopefully, they still feel that way.  They are subject to Squeak-L, but 
still owners of the Agreement.