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Castle Technology UK Ripping off Kernel Code?
Jonathan Riddell writes "`It would appear that Castle Technology Limited, UK, have taken some of the Linux 2.5 code, and incorporated it into their own product, "RISC OS", which is distributed in binary ROM form built into machines they sell. This code is linked with other proprietary code.' Full details from Russell King on lkml."
It depends on who holds copyright to the associated pieces of code. Best bet is that it's been assigned to the EFF, but it could also be Linus and/or some of the people who wrote the bulk of the code.
It'll actually be rather interesting (in ~200 years) when it comes time to determine when the code's copyright expires. Just who's lifetime does each piece of code expire in relation to?
OS Software is like love: The best way to make it grow is to give it away.
No, it means that they are commiting willful copyright infringement for commercial gain. The penalties for that are severe and include the larger of statutory and actual damages. The statutory damages can be up to $100K, iirc. Actuals include any revenue which results from the infringement.
I hope somebody tears them a new sphincter, if this is true.
Copyright law allows for something called "statutory damages", which means that if someone infringes on your (registered) copyright you can collect a fixed amount without having to document monetary loss.
"Nobody lost anything", except control over their creations.
Copyright grants a partial legal monopoly on distribution of the copyrighted work. The owner can make people pay for it (the usual approach), or make them accept the GPL, or even prevent circulation of the work altogether (the way Sinatra pulled the movie "Suddenly" off the market after the Kennedy assassination).
During the discovery phase of the trial, the defendent would have to produce the complete source code and build instructions for their product. The plaintiff would have an expert follow the build instructions and verify that they result in the exact exectuable that the defendent ships. Then the expert would examine the source code for "substantial similarity" to the copyrightable elements of the linux kernel code. A judge would hear this testimony and rebuttals and examine the evidence it was based on.
Legal arguments on affirmative defences of fair use and licence compliance could be made. The judge would rule on infringement, then if the plaintiff prevails, he would rule on damages. Factors influencing damages would be willfulness of the infringement and the presense or absense of commercial gain as a result of the infringement.
Nope. Consider the physical-property equivalent: I steal something from you. Do you have the right to come steal it back? No. Similarly, if they "steal" GPL'd code, we don't have a right to steal it back; the legally correct course of action is to file suit, get an injunction against distribution of the stolen code, and recoup losses from the infringer.
You are confusing the conditions for complying with the licence with the penalties for infringing the copyright.
The judge *could* order compliance with the licence as part of the penalty phase, but it is much more likely that he would award monitary damages.
The interesting thing is that each patch to the linux kernel could be viewed as separately copyrighted by whoever the author of that particular patch is. The statutory damages can reach $100K per violation if the judge wants it to.
The problem with that argument is that it betrays a lack of understanding of the rewards of free-software. When people share software, they expect IMPROVEMENTS. The software is GIVEN AWAY, so that improvements, in the form of making the code more efficient, more portable, more usable, are all the "payment-in-kind" for software. What is damaged is not that there's erosion of the user base (there is) but it is also that one can have any expectations. That someone can use something to imporve himself alone, and forget about the rest of the world.
No.. the GPL ONLY gets it's strength from copyright law. IF copyright law allows it, the GPL can be IGNORED.
The GPL is the set of terms under which you can do things OTHER than what you are allowed to do under standard copyright.
It is not a use license, you don't agree to it in order to use said software; it is a license that grants you extra rights beyond what copyright does should you CHOOSE to use it (abide by it's terms).
Actually, speaking as the webmaster of www.riscos.org, that quote is mine, and I have no link to Castle Technology at all. If you're going to call someone names, at least check your facts to see who you're accusing.
www.riscos.org is completely independent and in no way affiliated to ANY RISC OS hardware manufacturers.
AFAIK, no kernel code has been assigned to the EFF. But you really meant the FSF, which has most of the S390 stuff, but nothing else.
But if you're a kernel hacker, especially in the core, and want to see the GPL get enforced more effectively, just write to assign@gnu.org, and assign copyright to the FSF. Right now, almost everyone who uses the kernel also uses various GNU userspace applications. That's what lets me do my job of enforcing the GPL. But it would be much easier if the FSF simply had copyright in one or two core kernel files.
Become a FSF associate member before the low #s are used
The sources used by RISCOS Ltd are not those used by Castle; the sources that RISCOS Ltd use were licensed a number of years ago from Acorn and do not include any components which are GPL, and acknowledge the components which they do use. Castle have, alledgedly, licensed their sources from Pace Microtechnology plc (the company who bought Acorn) and presumably added the PCI code from the Linux kernel themselves. I say presumably because I can't say one way or another whether the work was done by Pace or by Castle. Castle, as publishers of the product, are those who must be looked to for answers.
I think you should read that GPL again. It does not give someone the right to distribute the code (or parts of the code) in binary form, but then requires whomever distributes it to also offer the sources as well - and give credit to the original authors. They are also prohibited from not extending these same distribution rights and obligations to who get their software. So that company can use parts from the kernel, but they have to give out the sources of their software and give credit where it's due - as well as the permission to redistribute the software under the GPL. If I understand correctly, they have failed to do this.
In other words, yes, you were wrong, and have now been corrected. GPL does not mean Public Domain (even though the two share some similarities). It seems you're going to keep waiting a looong time for whatever gripe you have with the GPL to materialize.
Reminder: find a new sig
A brief history lesson, that might help to make one or two things clearer. Its as accurate as I can manage, but don't sue me for slipups, right? Years ago there was Acorn Computers Ltd; they produced the BBC Micro, BBC Master etc. They then set about designing their own 32 bit cpu for their next generation of computers, and the ARM chip was born. ARM Limited was formed as a spin off and carries on administrating the architecture today. Acorn went on to use the ARM chip in various computers; its first OS was called Arthur, which later developed into RISC OS. Acorn used RISC OS both in desktop targetted machines and increasingly in a range of set top box like products and other embedded devices. The first bunch of ARM chips developed ran in what was called '26 bit mode' (don't worry about it), and the OS largely depended on some custom support chips. Eventually Acorn took the decision to drop out of the desktop market; when it did so, it granted a license to a new company (RISC OS Ltd) to the latest version (4) of its software. RISC OS Ltd carried on developing this OS and continue to do so today as part of their Select scheme. Shortly after granting the license, Acorn split into 2 sections; one became element 14, and the other was taken over by Pace. Pace carried on developing RISC OS in house, and produced a 32 bit hardware independent version of RISC OS. Later, AIUI, Pace stopped RISC OS development work, and shortly afterwards Castle announced that it was bringing desktop machines to market using the Pace version of RISC OS. Some sort of license deal had been made between Pace and Castle - my understanding is fuzzy here, I don't know if its a direct license or whether Castle have a license through another third party. It is this latest version of RISC OS that the accusation of use of GPL'd code has been made against. RISC OS Ltd, ARM Ltd, and Element-14 (AIUI now subsumed by Broadcom) are *not* implicated in any way - don't send them hate mail! riscos.org are *not* implicated in any way - thats a web site run by enthusiasts. Its not clear to me at which point the GPL'd code got introduced into the source tree; it could have been at any point after the RISC OS Ltd tree was forked from Acorns original source. Also, for those that don't know, Russell King was one of the prime instigators of ARM Linux, so together with Linus himself is probably one of the most significant opinions on this matter. FWIW: I'm an independent software contractor, who has worked under contract for Acorn, Pace, e-14, and RISC OS Ltd (though not on the portion of the code under discussion). I have no axe to grind here - this post is purely intended to sort out who the players in this particular drama are (and aren't!)
The sad thing is that I had really heard nice things about RISCOS... if it were possible to get an old machine inexpensively in the US, I would have tried it.
That's a bit like saying that you would not buy a second hand 486 with MS DOS on, because a different PC manufacturing company ripped off some GPL code last year to get part of their new system working.
I think a lot of people are getting Castle confused with RISC OS, and in this case even Acorn, who don't exist any more - the code being discussed is for the new Castle Iyonix machine, released just before Christmas 2002. It is the first 32 bit RISC OS machine, and as such needs a 32 bit OS. Castle have released RISC OS 5, which is based on RISC OS which is licensed by Pace, who bought it from Acorn just before they were closed down (about 5 years ago I believe).
It is RISC OS 5 that has the alleged GPL breach; previous versions of RISC OS have nothing to do with Castle, apart from Castle's machines run RISC OS.
As a general comment, it would be nice if people on slashdot spent a little more time looking into the facts before posting.
On a separate note, if you really are interested in getting an old Acorn machine, there are a lot of second hand Acorn machines available at extremely reasonable prices if you're willing to spend a little time looking for it - for example, newsgroups, community websites, magazines (such as Archive, which has a small ads section), or companies which sell second hand RISC OS machines, like CJE Micros.
I'm dangerous when I know what I'm doing