Slashdot Mirror

Someone please mod this idiot down.

From http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html#GPLRequireSourcePostedPublic:

Does the GPL require that source code of modified versions be posted to the public?

        The GPL does not require you to release your modified version, or any part of it. You are free to make modifications and use them privately, without ever releasing them. This applies to organizations (including companies), too; an organization can make a modified version and use it internally without ever releasing it outside the organization.

Wrong.

9. The Free Software Foundation may publish revised and/or new versions
of the General Public License from time to time. Such new versions will
be similar in spirit to the present version, but may differ in detail to
address new problems or concerns.

Each version is given a distinguishing version number. If the Program
specifies a version number of this License which applies to it and "any
later version", you have the option of following the terms and conditions
either of that version or of any later version published by the Free
Software Foundation. If the Program does not specify a version number of
this License, you may choose any version ever published by the Free Software
Foundation.

Source

They can copy the Linux kernel which they can acquire at GPLv2 and then give it out (modified or not) as GPLv3 and those who receive it from them can only use it under the license they received it in, or a newer version. If they want an earlier version of the license then they must find someone willing to give them a copy with an earlier version attached.

In short, the GPL is forwards compatible not backwards compatible.

Wrong. The Linux kernel specifies version 2. It does not include the "or later" clause which would allow the use of a later license.

ulessthanme

9. The Free Software Foundation may publish revised and/or new versions of the General Public License from time to time. Such new versions will be similar in spirit to the present version, but may differ in detail to address new problems or concerns. Each version is given a distinguishing version number. If the Program specifies a version number of this License which applies to it and "any later version", you have the option of following the terms and conditions either of that version or of any later version published by the Free Software Foundation. If the Program does not specify a version number of this License, you may choose any version ever published by the Free Software Foundation.

Source

They can copy the Linux kernel which they can acquire at GPLv2 and then give it out (modified or not) as GPLv3 and those who receive it from them can only use it under the license they received it in, or a newer version. If they want an earlier version of the license then they must find someone willing to give them a copy with an earlier version attached.

In short, the GPL is forwards compatible not backwards compatible.

http://gcc.gnu.org/wiki/History

"At this point, I concluded I would have to write a new
compiler from scratch. That new compiler is now known as GCC; none of the
Pastel compiler is used in it, but I managed to adapt and use the C front
end that I had written."

The Creator obviously didn't NULL-terminate.

Of course not. Lisp strings aren't null terminated.

Your characterization fails to convey that you understand why he says what he does. Freedom, for its own sake, is worth pursuing. He doesn't make his claims exaggerating and mischaracterizing like you do ("the universe will explode"). He gives frank and factual examinations of reality showing where a loss of freedom leads to people losing their rights. You picked a particularly poor time to make your half-hearted critique as right now Amazon has again been caught removing e-books from customer's "Kindle" devices, including Amazon workers chastising those seeking a refund for the e-books that have been taken from them without their consent. It's not hard to see how paying for an e-book you don't get to keep and having someone else choose what you're allowed to read on your device is bad for people. Things like this help us understand why Stallman refers to the Amazon Kindle as the Amazon Swindle. He saw stuff like this happening many years ago and wrote his dystopic short story about the practical consequences of non-freedom. Check out his reaction to a 2005 incident when a Harry Potter book was sold before its intended for-sale date; I haven't read anyone else give a cogent thoughtful analysis like he did.

You said "Like most other expressions of concern that come from brother Stallman" and then cited none. Your followup cites nothing. Saying "not that his concerns are never valid" is meaningless because nobody is wrong all the time; you're saying that as a shield so you can come back later and claim that your objections only contain mild inaccuracies when your theme is profoundly wrong and undefended. You seem to want to criticize Stallman for being unpopular (with an audience that should know better than to accept claims like yours without specific evidence, quite frankly) yet you ignore the examples he points to and what's going on around you.

In the other direction, if copyright of your work extends to three generations, and you have the opportunity and talent, you can invest twenty years of your life in the holodeck project

But then you can't draw from other people's work still under copyright because you don't know who currently owns the legal right to sell you a license.

with the incentive of being able to provide financially not only for your self, but also for your grandchildren.

If you want life insurance, buy life insurance. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. Copyright need not be.

I'd propose the consolidation of patents, trademarks, copyright and any similar intellectual innovation to a single bill.

Mr. Stallman would disagree.

Except it is so sad, there's nothing to laugh about.

http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html

Stallman is actually extremely accurate, sometimes verging on "prescient"("The Right To Read" written a fair few years vs. Amazon's remote kindle wipes or Apple's 'cryptographically blessed software only' smash hit... for instance).

Or the Java trap.* (Meaning it's not enough for Sun to be friendly to the OSS/free software community, it has to guarantee those freedoms with appropraite licenses. Also GPLv3 was before the Oracle takeover.) Sun wasn't applying the GPL license to Java and OpenOffice until some anti-Java activism from Stallman.

* It doesn't mean I don't develop in Java. Actually, I like it pretty much, and the licensing of Mono isn't any better either. They're just not on the same level of freedom as e.g. Gnome.

Not that his concerns are never valid, but he has become the Chicken Little of geekdom.

I would venture to say that Stallman's essay on "the right to read" was rather prescient at the time. Like him or not, I doubt that anyone knowledgeable about RMS would call him the "Chicken Little of geekdom."

Banish your ignorance and read some of RMS' writings. You might be surprised that the hype doesn't always live up to the reality.

Pretty much what Stallman was writing about all those years ago, when the technology to enforce such a draconian regime didn't exist yet.

Of course, most everybody labeled him a wingnut.

Interesting. Good points (and you made some good ones upthread).

So, stir in some dual-license JDKs and Oracle's set to shakedown the entire Java programming industry.

Let us never think RMS wasn't eerily prophetic with his Java Trap warnings back in 2004!

No thanks to yet another way to drive up the cost of free software. How else can Microsoft make distribution on shiny disks competitive again? Patent extortions? That's a whole other issue that strangely has help from ATT in Texas.

Thank you, hairyfeet, for pointing out the obvious anti-competitive nature of pay by the minute internet service. You might want to mention that cable companies already have all the bandwith anyone could want but they use 99% for pay per view movies and other rip off services.

Now, let's look at some possible solutions. Municiple networks and Open Spectrum are winners that make entertainment and telcos very nervous.

Municiple wires work well in Tacoma, Washington which only has 250,000 people, so it should work just about anywhere and it should. Almost all US cable networks were built with monopoly protection and have that obligation to the public.

Open Specturm and free software are really the only way to insure free speech in the future. If you haven't figured it out yet, non free software and network control are two sides of the same coin. It's about the power to shove adverts in your face and control public opinion about issues, just like the good old days of broadcast and switched networks. Only free software gives you control of your computer and only free networks let you share news and opinions with your neighbors. The rest resembles the old USSR more than anything else, the publisher's paradise. We already own what we need to stay free, all we lack is the collective knowledge and will to take it.

Pundits talk like most people are purely consumers of content, not creators.

Of course people working for a publisher are more likely to push the misconception that only people working for a publisher can be authors.

At least in the white-collar world, though, almost everyone is a content creator when they're at work.

The problem will come when only people who are at work can afford tools to create. This has already happened in video game development; Nintendo requires an office and previous published titles on someone else's platform before it'll sell you a devkit for one of its platforms.

How long until an application targeting both GCC and Microsoft Visual C++ can use C++0x features?

I suppose until the standard is truely finalized nothing can really be said to have "full" support. As far as the subset of what is existing now, a simple search finds the existing GCC and VC10 supported features.

Richard Stallman was selling tapes of Emacs and GCC back in the 80s and made sure the GPL allowed selling.

Here's his essay about how to do it but at the same time ensure it doesn't end up funding proprietary software:

http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/selling.html

774651 sure is a lot. But I have a (funny) feeling that the license I use has been used before as well. I heard about this license sharing from other people on the internet. I got a copy of the software (along with a good working license) and tried it. It works really well too. I found a pretty good place where you can get the software along with the license. I know people who insist that licenses be paid hate it, but sometimes thats just the way things are. They can suck it up. Anyway, just for you, I'll post a link to where you can get the software and a copy of the license. Its right Here.

That's why I use GNU Savannah for all my services. Oh, wait...

http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/pirate-party.html

"So what would be the effect of terminating this program's copyright after 5 years? This would not require the developer to release source code, and presumably most will never do so. Users, still denied the source code, would still be unable to use the program in freedom. [..] So I proposed that the Pirate Party platform require proprietary software's source code to be put in escrow when the binaries are released. The escrowed source code would then be released in the public domain after 5 years."

Requiring the release of source code is not freedom, and that is why I put it in quotes.

Does it look to you like this GNU code was written by a wise old neckbeard? It's 780 lines of unreadable crap. This is what the code of a wise old neckbeard looks like.

Savannah is down too... but no one cares :)
http://savannah.gnu.org/

"Other companies want to use your new super-efficient power source... They couldn't care less about your new pop song."

Your assumption that the most useful thing that may be copyrighted is a pop song is ridiculous. Other companies want to use source code, which is copyrighted not patented. Indeed, it is the GPL, which is a form of copyright known as copyleft, that allows us to have excellent software accessible to all for free.

Actually, the release of the author's rights is what "allows us to have excellent software accessible to all for free." If copyleft did not exist, free software still could - see, e.g. any free software prior to 2007, v1 of the GPL.

That said, copyright protects only that specific embodiment of the work. Other companies may want to use the source code to save time and expense of independent recreation, but if they do perform that independent recreation, they do not infringe copyright at all. That's why patent rights are stronger - they protect even against independent recreation.

This still doesn't help the primary argument, which was that "zomg patent rights are going to be extended for hundreds of years," to which I say, FUD is not evidence. Provide some evidence to counter the evidence to the contrary over the past 220 years, or accept that your fears are unfounded.

"Other companies want to use your new super-efficient power source... They couldn't care less about your new pop song."

Your assumption that the most useful thing that may be copyrighted is a pop song is ridiculous. Other companies want to use source code, which is copyrighted not patented. Indeed, it is the GPL, which is a form of copyright known as copyleft, that allows us to have excellent software accessible to all for free.

The relevant parts of the LGPL v2.1 are:

4. You may copy and distribute the Library (or a portion or derivative of it, under Section 2) in object code or executable form under the terms of Sections 1 and 2 above provided that you accompany it with the complete corresponding machine-readable source code, which must be distributed under the terms of Sections 1 and 2 above on a medium customarily used for software interchange. If distribution of object code is made by offering access to copy from a designated place, then offering equivalent access to copy the source code from the same place satisfies the requirement to distribute the source code, even though third parties are not compelled to copy the source along with the object code.

and

6. [...] For an executable, the required form of the "work that uses the Library" must include any data and utility programs needed for reproducing the executable from it. However, as a special exception, the materials to be distributed need not include anything that is normally distributed (in either source or binary form) with the major components (compiler, kernel, and so on) of the operating system on which the executable runs, unless that component itself accompanies the executable. It may happen that this requirement contradicts the license restrictions of other proprietary libraries that do not normally accompany the operating system. Such a contradiction means you cannot use both them and the Library together in an executable that you distribute.

Basically, you have to provide to everyone that you distribute your binaries to (directly or via third party) and that ask for it, the sources and make scripts needed to compile the QT libraries. In practice you can just download a copy of the QT sources and either put that on your distribution medium or offer it for download on your site next to your binaries. The safest thing is probably to bundle everything (your executables, the QT binaries and QT sources) in one installer. In that case, nobody can bother you about the sources afterwards

Also acceptable is to provide a direct link to the Nokia download site, but you will have to download and keep a copy for yourself, so you can provide the sources yourself if the original provider disappears.

Regards.

If such an object file uses only numerical parameters, data structure layouts and accessors, and small macros and small inline functions (ten lines or less in length), then the use of the object file is unrestricted, regardless of whether it is legally a derivative work.

On the GNU website you can find the official standpoint on this matter.

I love the way people say this stuff about the LGPL.. have you ever actually read it? This is the bit you're probably referring to:

6. As an exception to the Sections above, you may also combine or link a "work that uses the Library" with the Library to produce a work containing portions of the Library, and distribute that work under terms of your choice, provided that the terms permit modification of the work for the customer's own use and reverse engineering for debugging such modifications.

The newer version 3 of the license has more clear wording, which are actually more restrictive.. permitting modification of only the library not the combined work.

In either case, every time you say "you can link to LGPL licensed libraries without having to do anything!!" you're inviting people to violate the author of that library's license.. I'm sure they appreciate it.

I love the way people say this stuff about the LGPL.. have you ever actually read it? This is the bit you're probably referring to:

6. As an exception to the Sections above, you may also combine or link a "work that uses the Library" with the Library to produce a work containing portions of the Library, and distribute that work under terms of your choice, provided that the terms permit modification of the work for the customer's own use and reverse engineering for debugging such modifications.

The newer version 3 of the license has more clear wording, which are actually more restrictive.. permitting modification of only the library not the combined work.

In either case, every time you say "you can link to LGPL licensed libraries without having to do anything!!" you're inviting people to violate the author of that library's license.. I'm sure they appreciate it.

Stephen Fry also did a video for the GNU project's 25th birthday:

http://www.gnu.org/fry/ "Freedom Fry"

As others already explained, GNU/Linux doesn't have any UNIX code in it. It merely tracks same design principles. As others didn't point out, Linux is essentially only a kernel and it doesn't run on its own. So it uses GNU as user-land, hence GNU/Linux. GNU means GNU's Not Unix, and it obviously doesn't have any UNIX code either.

Why they didn't develop different kernel you ask? GNU project tried that. It is called GNU Hurd. It uses Mach Micro-kernel which on low level does not resemble UNIX and is completely different design, but on high level uses set of daemons to implement POSIX functionality (because that is a must). But Hurd is didn't take off, mostly because Mach was new and alien thing to most people, while Linux is clone of UNIX and there are lots of UNIX programmers. Other reason is that Mach turned out to be flawed is some ways, which nobody knew back then, when was decided to base Hurd on Mach micro-kernel. But there is still development on Hurd, it might get a new micro-kernel so we might have free gerneral purpose multi-server micro-kernel, after all. There is working Debian GNU/Hurd distro if you care to try.

Here is history of GNU
http://www.gnu.org/gnu/thegnuproject.html

Tell you what, I'll split the difference with you when you hand in your geek card and read:

http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html

Hand in your geek card and go read Selling Free Software.

In time you'll see that phrase disappear, hopefully along with the overuse of the term "content".

RMS agrees with you about "content" and "intellectual property".

Along with "SKU", these always make me grind my teeth.

Perhaps I'm biased because I work for an e-tailer, but what's wrong with "stock keeping unit" to refer to a particular, distinctly sold variant of a product?

Haha!! Great description, yep :D

BTW every time I see your sig I think of this ditty:

A host is a host
From coast to coast
And nobody talks to a host that's close,
Unless the host that isn't close
Is busy, hung, or dead.

Which by coincidence, on a search first comes up at http://www.gnu.org/fun/jokes/errno.2.html

I know there's something significant here, but I think -- Ow!! My shorts are on fire!!!

If you look at the list of requirements for a program to be Open Source,
http://www.opensource.org/docs/osd
No 6 says "6. No Discrimination Against Fields of Endeavor". Saying you can't use it on a production server doesn't appear to comply with that.

Similarly, the Free Software definition
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html
Freedom 0 says you should be allowed to run the program for any purpose.

So yes, I would say OpenSolaris has been killed off and replaced with a demoware program.

I agree that this "could" be done, just as Java could be compiled directly to native code (in fact has been - http://gcc.gnu.org/java ).
However, there are solid reason why neither of these is done on a "normal" basis. There are many benefits that C++ would lose if it were run on a JVM, just as there are benefits that Java would lose if it were compiled to native code. I won't go into these here, other than to say that each language exists within it's own realm and has been tweaked to take advantage of it's own realm.
I believe the point that BigJeff5 was making was that natively compiled code is inherently faster than JVM executed code and while "all things being equal" that might be "theoretically" true, in reality that is "typically" just not the case.
Just as an example of what I'm referring to, the executable code from the C++ program I wrote and compiled 15 years ago for my 486 processor may still run fine on my Core 2 Duo, but it certainly won't take advantage of all the processor improvements and new instructions that have been implemented since then because it's machine code is frozen in time. However, the Java program I wrote at the same time will also run on my new machine, but it will now take advantage of all the new JVM features as well as fully exploit the new instructions and architectural improvements of my more modern CPU.

Java ports to the Java platform.

...but can be compiled to native code using gcj, which is part of gcc.

but Larry or Sergey should take all their money and buy FB if they don't want to become "that other Internet company".

...or, they could buy Diaspora*, GNU Social, and the like, then throw ressource and developpers at it (join the efforts of buzz ?) and try to develop a nice *decentralised* and *federated* social network system.

Then patiently wait (while still polishing the quality of the result) until the next usual FB privacy-blunder. Serve the now million-sized complain to FB, and publicly complain about how then don't do anything about it.
Publicy announce "Google DiaSocialZZ" (or whatever) and let the thing roll.

Okay, maybe Google has had a recent row of flops in its stint in the social world (Wave closed, Buzz un popular).
On the other hand they also have had excellent success when picking up the correct startup (Android, Docs, etc.).

So they might have success opposing FB, or at least bringing standards into the social realm (FB got already forced into standard regarding their chat system and an XMPP interface)
And given the giant that FB has become, Google probably is the only one with the necessary ressources to succeed.

PS:
Along the way, they could buy Zynga, too. For Google social, Android (phones, TV) and Chrome OS ports of games.

What's next? Making plumbing a licensed profession which requires a a security clearance and supplies being available only from a licensed shop?

The console makers have already done this to video game programming. GNU project founder Richard Stallman has written a short story predicting a worst-case scenario in which other kinds of programming meet the same fate, all in the name of DRM.

Unencrypted access points already use a standard password: the empty password. How is this any different?

Freedom to learn about anything

This assumes the user WANTS to learn about anything computer related. Anyone believing this is a benefit to the user is at disconnect with general userland. Here is exactly what the majority of computer users want to learn: "The absolute bare minimum required to do the tasks I want to do".

Well, this freedom 1 of the four essential freedoms for software users. Of course freedom 0 and 2 matter more to casual users of software (i.e. running and distributing the software as you wish).

It's like UNIX with proper multi-user management and a mature security architecture.

Ask 100 people off the street if this sentence makes ANY sense whatsoever to them. These people work AROUND spyware infections until they are no longer able to do so. These people are the ones that I saw at a fair who gave their name, street address, and their home phone number in exchange for a free ice cream cone.

Well, claiming that there is a silver bullet for security would be factually incorrect. However given the same user, a GNU/Linux system is much safer than a Windows system. But if people are unwilling to educate themselves, they will have to learn from experience. Just think about identity theft in the context of online banking.

It almost never crashes.

Getting warmer. Most people would agree that this is a desirable attribute, and definitely the strongest on the list.

Proper file system meaning no need to defrag your drive.

While most people would again consider this desirable, too many treat this like backing up - something they should do, they know is a good idea to do, but simply don't.

Well, I think it makes quite a difference. Recent Windows versions by default run defragmentation once a week. I.e. when you switch on a Windows machine it will be very unresponsive for the first 30 minutes.

To them, Windows is free because the cost of an OEM license is baked into the sticker price of their laptop.

Vista users who want to update their software would disagree.

Caveats:
-The Sims doesn't work, nor do any Valve/Steam games.

That caveat is included on the website.

-iTunes won't work. The comparable program (Amarok) will sync music, but doesn't access the iTunes Media Store, doesn't back up your iPhone (or activate it), and doesn't sync apps.

I consider the lack of iTunes presence an advantage!

-Many digital camcorders won't work (No AVCHD editing).

I don't know AVHCD. Most camcorders use DV1394 and you can use dvgrab (or a GUI frontend) to capture the stuff. Then one can use MEncoder which supports multi-pass encoding to compress the video. Admittedly video editing for casual users was a problem last time I checked.

-Printers could possibly work out of the box, could work with a bit of configuration, could work with a lot of configuration, or might not work at all. The same is true for some more obscure wireless chipsets, and some specialty hardware.

IMHO the Linux printing software which uses the Postscript standard gives you much better control when trying to bring something to paper.

Get a group of 100 people, present them your list, and then present them mine. Let me know if you need to start counting on more than one hand how many you can sell with your list.

Of course it's always seems easier to argue for the status-quo.

Opensuse 11.3 KDE is really, REALLY nice. I like it a lot. It worked with most of my hardware out of th

It is Telstra's problem but there's an interesting wrinkle consider that GPLv2 (the version of the GPL the Linux kernel uses) is harsher to infringers than GPLv3.

Under the GPLv2 Telstra is not allowed to distribute the GPLd work until they get permission from all of the Linux kernel's copyright holders. This is one of the reasons GPLv3 is preferred over GPLv2; GPLv3 is kinder to accidental infringers than GPLv2 is.

I use info all the time. It's very geared towards emacs programmers like me. The best info viewer is built into emacs, and it lets me read documentation without leaving emacs and opening up a web browser. In emacs: C-h i

The thing to remember about info pages if you are *not* an emacs user is that they generate html documentation. In fact, all the gnu html docs are actually generated from info docs. For example, the glibc manual mentioned in the review:

http://www.gnu.org/software/libc/manual/html_node/index.html

So in a sense info is the best of both worlds in that it can be read from a web browser, or from a terminal based application like emacs, and it supports hyperlinks in both.

PS: I am a OSS (not necessarily FOSS as I sell GPL software for Symbian and Andoid) supporter but I know the weaknesses.

There's a common misconception that Free Software (capital "F") equates with "you can't make money on it" or "you can't sell it." Nothing is further from the case.

There's nothing wrong with selling Free Software. In fact, the Free Software Foundation points out in their GPL FAQ that "The right to sell copies is part of the definition of free software. Except in one special situation, there is no limit on what price you can charge. (The one exception is the required written offer to provide source code that must accompany binary-only release.)"

So feel free to develop GPLed software and sell it. It's all good.

Stallman wrote the Java trap, and we all laughed. Sun is nice we thought, it'll be ok. We were all wrong. Stallman saw further, he saw that even if Sun was ok, if someone bought Sun, then things could get messy. Welcome to messy.

Actually, most of the platform has been open-sourced by Sun before the takeover under the 'OpenJDK' name.

Indeed, GNU now carries a 'headnote' to the article explaining the new situation: http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/java-trap.html

The situation is still messy - but not for the original reasons laid out in that article. If worst came to worst, the JVM can be forked - but forking a widely-used platform is a whole other can of worms, of course.

Of course, Lissa did not necessarily intend to read his books. She might want the computer only to write her midterm. But Dan knew she came from a middle-class family and could hardly afford the tuition, let alone her reading fees. Reading his books might be the only way she could graduate. [...]
Dan resolved the dilemma by doing something even more unthinkable—he lent her the computer, and told her his password. [...]
His decision to help her led to their marriage, and also led them to question what they had been taught about piracy as children. The couple began reading about the history of copyright, about the Soviet Union and its restrictions on copying, and even the original United States Constitution. [...] When the Tycho Uprising began in 2062, the universal right to read soon became one of its central aims.

http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html

Emacs has both.

Emacs has both.

The GPL has a few things to say about providing access to source code, even if you're just distributing unmodified works.

After, I receive the binary, I can do anything I want with it like copy it onto a CD and put it in a cereal box. The GPL is a "source" license, not an EULA or sales license.

Really? try it and see what happens..
The GPL is a license.(PERIOD)
if person A distributes anything (for money for free doesn't matter) they are giving away a set of right/restrictions with it (What one might call a license) because there is such a thing called COPYRIGHT. One can give it away and every right that comes with it freely without any restriction at all .. that we call Public Domain.
Or as it happens with the GPL, anyone distributing (by means of COPYING which can't happen in a brick and mortar store --at least if the store is not producing the cd/dvd theme selves) a SOFTWARE that was LICENSED to them (not given) under the terms of that same license to give (in exchange of money or not) -among other things- the source code, or at least a mean to obtain it (like a web site or something).

0. This License applies to any PROGRAM or OTHER WORK which contains a notice placed by the copyright holder saying it may be distributed under the terms of this General Public License. The "Program", below, refers to any such program or work, and a "work based on the Program" means either the Program or any derivative work under copyright law: that is to say, a work containing the Program or a portion of it, either verbatim or with modifications and/or translated into another language. (Hereinafter, translation is included without limitation in the term "modification".) Each licensee is addressed as "you". Activities other than copying, distribution and modification are not covered by this License; they are outside its scope. The act of running the Program is not restricted, and the output from the Program is covered only if its contents constitute a work based on the Program (independent of having been made by running the Program). Whether that is true depends on what the Program does.

the above is rule number 0, it defines the scope of the license where does it say this applies only to a source code????
you can enjoy the reading on : http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-2.0.html#SEC2
Ah, also ... anything in the GPL is triggered there is distribution to anyone else besides the YOU in the license text. I one makes modifications to any Software licensed under GPL and keeps them for one's self the GPL doesn't restrict you in any way.

Is there something wrong with trying to make a profit? Shouldn't the free market decide if the value I add to a product is worth paying for?

...What really annoys you about the GPL is that you can't legally earn a living selling work that other people did. Not that a lot of people don't do it illegally anyway. I think forced sterilization would be an appropriate punishment.

Sorry, but you're wrong. It is perfectly legal to sell software under the GPL. Redhat, Mandriva, Linspire (formerly Lindows) all sold Linux. The catch is that you competition is free to give it away for free. Kinda makes it hard to sell what the next guy is giving away. This is why most Linux companies create their own Linux and sell it with support or other services. But there is nothing in the GPL that prevents one from selling it.

From HERE:

Does the GPL allow me to sell copies of the program for money?

        Yes, the GPL allows everyone to do this. The right to sell copies is part of the definition of free software. Except in one special situation, there is no limit on what price you can charge. (The one exception is the required written offer to provide source code that must accompany binary-only release.)