RMS Previews GPL3 Terms

An anonymous reader writes "In a recent interview, ESR shocked a lot of people when he said, 'We don't need the GPL anymore.' Federico Biancuzzi contacted RMS, founder of the Free Software Movement and initial developer of the GNU system, to talk about the past, the present, and the future of the GNU GPL. Among other things, they discussed the new clauses of the upcoming GPL version 3."

Comments

I can't help thinking that

[Anonymous Coward]

RMS would've made a great Supreme Court justice, had he gotten his law degree

Services

[Richard_at_work]

At last someone on the GPL 3 team has said something that belays my fears about Services and the GPL version 3. The fear was that they would force you to give users access to GPLed code you use when you provide a service - for example forum software. From the article, they talk about developers including an ability to have the service software offer the sourcecode, and the GPL protecting this particular part of the program but not forcing developers to include it in the first place. While this does stop the fears that you would have to provide the sourcecode for every bit of GPL code you use in your service, it does open the door for limitations on modifications in GPLed programs, similiar to invariant sections in the Gnu Documentation License, and Im not decided if this is a good approach or not.

Re:Where GPL ends and propriety can start?

[Knuckles]

I would really like to have clarification to my issues...

Ask the FSF's compliance lab:

The GPL Compliance Lab maintains resources for Free Software developers and others to learn about licensing. Members of the Free Software community are encouraged to consult with the FSF regarding licensing issues. However, before contacting the FSF please be sure to have reviewed the GPL FAQ before emailing us.

The Compliance Lab also makes its services available by paid consultation, allowing businesess to access our unique expertise. These consultation services include a software certification program which is explained in detail here.

And OT, when has the FSF revamped their website? Nifty.

Re:It's 2005, not 1985.

[swillden]

With all due respect, that's completely unproven, and in my opinion, completely untrue.

I recall an interview with the Linux team at IBM where they said they did not think IBM would have contributed code under a BSD license. It was important to IBM that IBM's competitors not be able to use their code in proprietary products. I'm sure there are plenty of other cases where significant contributions to Linux would not have happened if it were under another license.

It's hard to say that the GPL was essential to Linux, but I think it's very clear that the GPL has been helpful to Linux development. It has also enabled a major thrust of IBM's counterattack on SCO, which is perhaps not essential, but very pleasant :-)

Misunderstanding about Apache licenses

[pauljlucas]

From TFA:

We often hear that some 70 percent of web servers use Apache; what we don't hear is that a large fraction of those servers are using a nonfree modified version of Apache, as permitted by the Apache license.

Those servers could equally well use modified versions of Apache even if Apache were under the GPL. The GPL comes into play only if you distribute your modified versions of Apache. If you keep your changes in-house, the whole issue is moot.