Moglen On Enforcing The GPL

jdavidb writes: "The GNU Project has a new essay today by Eben Moglen, general legal counsel for GNU, about enforcing the GPL. People ranting about the GPL not holding up in court should read this. Very interesting, but I felt that this paragraph looked bad: 'In such situations we work with organizations to establish GPL-compliance programs within their enterprises, led by senior managers who report to us, and directly to their enterprises' managing boards, regularly.' I'm all for the GPL, but this sounds suspiciously like an Software Publishers' Association audit. On the other hand, circumstances of something like this would be completely different, i.e., illegally taking copyright privileges over software you didn't write, as opposed to illegally copying software." Actually, I also think they sound alike in certain ways, but that it makes sense -- since both are about unauthorized reproduction of software. I like the FSF's terms a lot more. Update: 09/18 19:53 PM GMT by T : As Dr. Nonsense points out, davidb "probably meant the dreaded audits by the Business Software Alliance," rather than the SPA.

Comments

I've run into this

[renehollan]

Here are some other grey areas:

1) installing modified GPL code on a machine for a customer to evaluate -- RMS has told me that if the customer controls the machine, it is distribution, but if the code modifier controls the machine, it is not.

We ran into this when installing a system for a customer for acceptance testing.

2) Distributing binaries ahead of source (i.e. to subcontractors). RMS has made it clear to me that this is verboten. He sympathized with our plight, but could find no way that the GPL would permit this. OTOH, in practical terms, as long a source was distributed as rapidly as possible, we would likely not face allegations of violation.

We ran into this when sending "the latest, greatest build of code" to subcontractors, or potential customers for evaluation on machines we do not control. Sometimes we'd want to ship an installation CD, or download updates to someone as part of work in progress. This is a technical violation.

3) redistribution within an organization. This is a real grey area -- is the organization in control of the code or the individuals who have access to it? Personally, I have taken the former approach, but have never refused to give mods to GPL code to coworkers, when asked.