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19 Patents Given To GPL Community
Raph responded:
For now, I'm only intending for the grant to extend to the GPL. One particular hazard I want to avoid is a potential proprietary licensee for the patent simply creating a "libraphspatent.so" (or "RAPHPTNT.DLL") that's licensed under, say, the X license, and then linking to their proprietary code. That scenario neither compensates me for the patents nor does it particularly help the cause of free software.
That said, I'm not by any means a GPL bigot. I've released quite a bit of code under less restrictive licenses in cases where I've felt the use of the code is more important than the other goals the GPL promotes. I just didn't see a way to make this grant extend to these other licenses without creating a serious hazard. There are some other people working to create patent pools for the benefit of free software generally, and I'm happy to work with them in this direction.
The Advogato article has more details on the grant itself and discussion of the consequences.
My take on this is that software patents are still bad. But there's not a hell of a lot we can do about them at this point, since the big corporations can put a lot more money into keeping them (not to say we shouldn't TRY, but...). Since we can't stop software patents, we instead use patents against those companies.
As for the comment about publishing as prior art instead of patenting, i see two problems: First, the big corporations can use them as well, which is why Ralph Levien went the patent route. Second, we've seen before how often the USPTO grants patents even with the existance of prior art.
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perl -e'$_=shift;die eval' '"$^X $0\047\$_=shift;die eval\047 \047$_\047"' at -e line 1.
Somewhat misleading. I don't know whether your BSD bias has crept into your comments, or whether your (apparent) ignorance on some of the fine points has caused the bias in the first place.
Either way, some clarification is in order.
GPL can never be used in a commercial product
So what are Red Hat, SuSE, and Caldera, to name but a few? Perhaps you meant "closed source" product, rather than "commercial". There is a difference.
GPL code can never be used in any application that is not also 100% GPL code
Not quite correct. It can be used in any non-GPL'd application that is not distributed. There's a lot of software development done entirely for in-house use. The GPL might technically apply to these if they use GPL'd source, but in practise it never applies if the application is never distributed to anyone else.
Finally, any mods made to GPL code must be made public - you must post the source, or provide it on request.
Same error as above. If I never post (or otherwise distribute) the binaries of mods I make to GPL'd code, I need never post the sources, either, and I can tell anybody asking for them to buzz off.
BSD can be used by anybody, for anything.
True. Some people, though, regard this as a serious flaw. Microsoft (among others) has made a lot of money off of BSD'd code, with no particular benefit to the rest of the developer community.
The proponents of GPL feel that imposing a non-commercial business model is the best way to keep software "free"
Cart before the horse. The GPL doesn't impose a non-commercial business model, although it does tend to (as a byproduct, via free market forces) enforce an upper limit on "what the market will bear" for the software.
Proponents of BSD feel it is the only "free" license, as it doesn't require you to become a non-profit to use the code
Neither does the GPL.
you can integrate it [BSD code] into proprietary [closed source] apps
This is certainly an advantage for those that want to take proprietary advantage of code somebody else has written. It's hard to see how this is an advantage to the authors of such code, unless they're happy just knowing that some of their code is buried in a Microsoft or Apple program somewhere, one that they can't even use unless they pay Microsoft or Apple for the privilege. Still, it seems that there are such folks out there.
Personally, I think that corporate subsidized BSD-type development WILL easily surpass GPL's contributions - as more and more corporations realize the value of releasing open source.
To date this doesn't seem to be the case. Most corporate developed software that has been open sourced has been released under some license that is far more restrictive than BSD.
Some corps release their work as GPL to prevent competitors from being able to benefit from it,
Not quite. The competitors may certainly benefit from it, since they may freely use it. However, the competitors won't benefit any more than the original authors, since they (competitors) can't incorporate the GPL'd source into their own closed product, or if they do incorporate the GPL'd code, they must then open up their own extensions such that the original company also has access. (Effectively levelling the playing field for all involved.)
Of course, there are problems using BSD code in GPL applications, as GPL demands that the code become GPL. In most of these cases, the BSD authors have allowed GPL forks of the code.
In most cases the BSD authors have no control over whether their code goes into GPL'd applications. So long as the BSD license doesn't place any restrictions on the code that the GPL doesn't (and in some cases where there's an advertising or author-acknowledgement clause, it might), the GPL "infects" any BSD-ish (or public domain, for that matter) code that gets rolled in to a GPL'd application. (Of course, the originalBSD or PD code is available outside the GPL). BSD authors shouldn't be particularly upset about this -- the license allows their code to be incorporated into totally closed and proprietary applications, too.
n the end, I think corporate subsidized BSD has to win. It actually has financial backing, so programmers can earn a paycheck for their work, instead of working as a waiter to subsidize your coding as one of the GPL authors recommended.
Hey, everyone should have a hobby. More seriously, whichcorporate subsidized BSD? Apple? Meanwhile, there are plenty of places (Red Hat, for example) paying programmers to write GPL'd code.
-- Alastair
That's not sharing--that's "helping yourself". Sharing is when I own something and I give it to you. Helping yourself is when I own something and you come and take it.
So what do you call it when someone independently develops a piece of software, licenses it under something other than GPL, and is then told "sorry, there's a GPL patent on that algorithm you use". This is the problem with patents. If someone were to go and develop the same thing completely independently, then they're still restricted. This is why patents are evil, because they restrict us without us even knowing about them. (the same isn't true of copyright, since you can't infringe upon a copyrighted work without knowing of its existance)
If members of the free software movement start using patents to fight proprietary software, then they're really no better than people in the crusades who "killed for Christ".
I have no problem with GPL software. I'm writing software right now that I intend to release under GPL. But I believe software patents are wrong, no matter who is using them. For the FSF to condone software patents that are restricted in any way is the epitome of hypocrisy.
And this would definitely put a huge hole in the argument that GPL isn't any stronger than copyright. Copyright allows clean room reimplementation, patents do not.
According to the GPL's preamble, any patented code used in GPL'd code must be licensed for everyone's free use or not licensed at all. Therefore, paradoxically enough, patents which are licensed only to GPL users may in fact violate the GPL.
I could be wrong; this is only in the preamble, rather than the body of the license proper (in fact, because of this, I am probably wrong). But it's something to think about. This does run somewhat counter to the GPL's philosophy, and that's not something which should just be ignored.
However, I do see what the patent holder is trying to do here. And I think it's good that finally we have some patents usable only in Open-Source software. I would make it so that the code is usable to anyone so long as the code was under any license which meets the OSD, but this is a good start.
Thanks
Bruce
Bruce Perens.