What should I do with the copyright details in a codebase when modifying it when it wasn't forked?

Question

So essentially, I once downloaded some script off github, forgot about it, then thought "Why not modify it!" and thus now decided to push it to my github account...

Question is though, do i keep the copyright details in the code? What do i do with it? I didn't fork it because i thought it would be weird to fork it just to add my own modification to it, and preferred to start "fresh".

I did do the following though:

• Use the same license as the original author, which is the MIT license.
• Give due credit at the end of the readme on the original repo.

But what else should i do? Should i just add my own name and dates in the copyright details of the script with theirs or? Any advice/feedback welcome.

EDIT:

I know i could do this, but i believe that only apply to forks as mentioned. I also didn't keep the "brand" name and changed the name of the project (but kept the copyright details in the modification).

I also know i could do this too but the advice mainly suggest to "put it at the beginning of the file", while the current copyright notice is put in the middle (which is the one printed on screen when listing flag options)...Does that still apply here?

Here is the repo i made for details.

Answer 1

I think this may be one of those cases where people get confused about copyright because they're caught up in the mechanics of github.

You have downloaded a copy of a piece of code licensed under MIT, modified it, and uploaded the resulting code to your github account. You are now maintaining a separate copy of a piece of someone else's code, which may change differently to the copy they are maintaining. This is a fork; just because it wasn't done through github's "fork" tool doesn't make it not a fork.

But fortunately, we don't need to get caught up in semantics, because the MIT license's obligations are unaffected by what you, or I, or indeed my local restaurant, calls a fork. It says that

Permission is hereby granted ... to ... modify..., distribute ... and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

So the licence text is clear. You do need to preserve their copyright notice, though you should add an appropriate one of your own. You are not obliged to distribute your work under the MIT licence, but it's good that you wish to do so, and it will mean that you're automatically including a copy of the MIT licence text, as the actual licence for your new, combined work, thus satisfying the other obligation placed on you.