"...I just think you're splitting hairs." And splitting hairs is pretty much what the legal system is about.

It matters. The difference is the defendant said "yes, we entered a contract" and not that the judge ruled "whether you admit it or not, you entered a contract." The former does not set legal precedent. The latter probably does.

No. The order says that iff what the plaintiff says is true, a contract probably exists :)

I see no justification for the arm of that 'iff' which is equivalent to "if what the plaintiff says is not true, then it is not the case that a contract probably exists".

Let's go to the decision:

    Defendant contends that Plaintiff’s reliance on
    the unsigned GNU GPL fails to plausibly demonstrate
    mutual assent, that is, the existence of a contract.
    Not so. The GNU GPL, which is attached to the
    complaint, provides that the Ghostscript user agrees
    to its terms if the user does not obtain a
    commercial license. Plaintiff alleges that Defendant
    used Ghostscript, did not obtain a commercial
    license, and represented publicly that its use of
    Ghostscript was licensed under the GNL GPU. These
    allegations sufficiently plead the existence of a
    contract. See, e.g., MedioStream, Inc. v. Microsoft
    Corp., 749 F. Supp. 2d 507, 519 (E.D. Tex. 2010)
    (concluding that the software owner had adequately
    pled a claim for breach of a shrink-wrap license).

Note the part that:

    Plaintiff alleges that Defendant
    used Ghostscript, did not obtain a commercial
    license, and represented publicly that its use of
    Ghostscript was licensed under the GNL GPU. These
    allegations sufficiently plead the existence of a
    contract."

IE if what the plaintiff said is true, it's a contract.

I see nothing in the decision that says the court would have found a contract without these allegations being true.

> I see nothing in the decision that says the court would have found a contract without these allegations being true.

Parent is nitpicking the different between the court ruling that the contract is likely to exists and the contract actually existing. For the former, plaintiff's allegations are absolutely necessary, for the latter - not so much.

In a sense, one can't say that "only if plaintiff's allegations are true, a contract exists" because plaintiff's arguments can be bullshit and the contract may still be valid for other reasons, even if no court would recognize it without proper evidence.

Hope that helps. And yes, it is a nitpick on the semantics of logic. Parent understands what the court ruled, the issue was solely with your post being (possibly amusingly) ambiguous to people dealing with too much formal logic.

"If what the paintiff says is not true, then it is not the case that certainly a contract probably exists".

Apparently parent is an intuitionist ;)

I hope you don't really mean 'iff' there.

Why not? Read it as "if and only if." If you disagree, then explain your disagreement.

I think the "only" part is dubious, i.e. a contract could possibly exist in various other circumstances as well :)

It may seem like "splitting hairs," but it's basic legal analysis. Learning when a contract is formed (which is the question at issue here; it's not about the substantive terms of the contract) is covered in everyone's first year of law school. And learning how contract and copyright relate is covered in the second or third year of law school, depending on when you take the course.

Not all contracts are enforceable. I would be surprised if the entirety of v3 is enforceable

Out of curiosity: which parts of v3 do you believe to be unenforceable?

I think that, given the time, effort, and professional expertise which went into drafting it, that the entire thing should be enforceable.