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Misconceptions About the GPL
lisah writes "Misconceptions about the widely used GNU General Public License (GPL) continue to plague the free software user community and, according to the ITManagersJournal, 'the confusion is frequently based on misreadings, rumors, secondhand accounts, and what is convenient to believe.' In order to clarify some of the more common misunderstandings about the GPL, Bruce Byfield consulted with three experts: attorney Richard Fontana, one of the main drafters of the third version of the license; Harald Welte of the GPL-Violations project; and David Turner who is assisting with revisions of the license. Together, they help clarify the distributor's role in providing source code to customers, whether GPL is viral or unenforceable, and why some misunderstandings are really rooted in varied interpretations of the law." ITMJ and Slashdot are both owned by OSTG.
I'll tell you what misconception annoys me the most. It's the idea that you need to agree to the GPL in order to use the software. I find it highly irritating to be asked to click-through a EULA window containing the GPL when I install a piece of software. The GPL is not a EULA, and you don't really have to agree to the GPL if you only intend to use the software. The GPL gives you rights to modify and redistribute the software; if you don't agree to the GPL, there is nothing else that would give you such rights. The right to use the software is implicit in the fact that it was legally distributed to you.
You are approaching the issue of freedom from the completely wrong angle. When you put a work under the GPL who gets the freedom?
Is it the developer? No, the developer gains no additional freedom by placing the work under the GPL.
Is it the user? No, though there are some nice clauses about requiring source code to be provided on demand, the user is no freer with a GPL'd work than with a work in the public domain or one covered by an arguably "freer" BSD-style license.
Then who gets the freedom? Good question! The software itself.
How can an inanimate thing like software gain freedom? Let me explain. By licensing software under the GPL, it guarantees that the software cannot be used in other non-GPL projects (give or take a license). Any code that comes into contact with GPL'd code gains the same freedom and the process continues so long as people continue to use the GPL code in their projects.
So software freedom is freedom for software. Free Software meets developers on an equal footing, not one based on a master/slave relationship like BSD licenses define. Closed source software treats software code as property, not much different from treating slaves as property. The GPL gives software code its very alienable right to not being used so shabbily.
If you want me to respect your closed license, then you can damned well respect my free one. It isn't too much to ask that if you distribute code I wrote, to distribute those changes you made to it so I can learn from them. That is the reason I release code. It isn't to make money. It isn't to gain fame. It is to learn from others as they learn from me. It amazes me the amount of bitching about this simple concept. It amazes me more that there are morons out there trying to pressure others to allow the closing of code in a free software environment. Doesn't sound very free to me. If you don't like the GPL then don't use it. There are a multitude of other "open source" licenses out there. /soapbox
B.
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