USDTV Subscribers Gouged For Linux USB Keys

Former USDTV Subscriber writes "A few weeks ago, Salt Lake City-based USDTV discontinued their service. USDTV used the Hisense DB2010 as subscriber boxes, with Linux based firmware. USDTV should have released the source and binaries as required by the GPL, in order for customers to create a USB key to convert their DB2010s to FTA HDTV boxes. Instead, they chose to hand the keys to former USDTV subcontractors. Cable Communications is coming to subscribers' houses and updating the boxes, but not leaving a USB key. ProServ is selling USB keys. But 'Due to copyright laws you are only allowed to purchase one of these keys if you have proof of being a current or previous subscriber to USDTV.' USDTV customers are being charged $30 for a service and/or files that should be freely available to anyone who has a DB2010 in their possession. There is a thread on the AVS Forum detailing the whole debacle."

Comments

Possibility of GPL Validation

[MrWGW]

Well, this would be a great opportunity for a lawsuit, instigated by the FSF or another stakeholder in the matter. The flipside of that, however, is that proponents of proprietary OSes would then immediately cite the case as an example of the "dangers" of using Linux.
Tough call; I'm in favor of an attempt to enforce the GPL (and potentially get validation from a US court that it is, in fact, a legally enforceable license).

Re:Possibility of GPL Validation

[Qzukk]

would then immediately cite the case as an example of the "dangers" of using Linux.

To which you respond by asking what they would think if the company had installed windows on all of these boxes without paying for a single license.

Same thing either way. You either pay with the code, or you pay with your cash. Or use BSD.

Re:Possibility of GPL Validation

[Chandon Seldon]

Your question: "The GPL has never been tested in court, is it really legal?" is way over-hyped. It originated as FUD from the SCO case. Legally, the GPL is on really solid ground - even moreso than EULAs for commercial software. It's a copyright license. Either the user agrees to it and gets to take actions not normally allowed by copyright law in exchange for whatever terms are in the license, or they don't and are restricted by copyright law.

But... even if the GPL needed a test case, this wouldn't be it. This case would be about whether $30 was a "reasonable" fee to distribute source code, and given that USB keys are like $15 the judge would probably rule that it's close enough to the cost of media to be OK. Even if the judge ruled that $30 was too much, the penalty would probably only consist of a requirement to charge $25 in the future and refund $5 to anyone who payed $30 and asks for the refund.

Re:Possibility of GPL Validation

[Anonymous Coward]

Why does everyone think the USB key contains the source code? It's just how you update the firmware on these boxes. You plug in a USB stick with the new firmware image, power on the receiver and wait a couple of minutes while the new firmware *binary* is written to the flash memory chip. That's just one more binary distribution that warrants a corresponding source offer, which is, in violation of the license, nowhere to be seen and neither is the source.

Re:Possibility of GPL Validation

[dch24]

USDTV has been doing a little of both: selling and leasing boxes to customers. But at this point, they are going into their second (or, depending on how you look at it, third) bankruptcy because the CEO and the president of the company have been ... well, doing some shady things.

Most of the (former) employees of USDTV (full disclosure: I was) were doing what it took to get a decent alternative to cable off the ground. It seemed like a good idea: send digital video over the air on unused bandwidth, capitalize on the switch to ATSC broadcasting, and earn a little revenue with some extra offerings, like PVR, pay-per-view, and some of the most popular cable channels. It was a very limited channel selection (plus all the free HDTV channels), but there were almost no infrastructure costs.

But the company had a serious problem with "too many chiefs, not enough indians" and after the second round of VC funding, the "chiefs" couldn't drum up any more loans. So now they're shutting down. There are lots of small startups in Utah that fail. It gives Utah a bad name in VC circles.

Tim Rikers (who does bzFlag) has been in contact with the company for some time, trying to obtain GPL compliance in the form of source code that will run on the HiSense box. If any of you out there would like to sell me your HiSense box, we can probably work out a deal. They're very capable of doing something like MythTV. As far as I know, USDTV has stalled until they're closing the doors.

And now, they're making you pay $30 to prevent your box from going into "Please Activate" mode, since none of the boxes will receive activations anymore. (Technically, they won't go into "please activate" until the first power outage.) In my opinion, they were in violation of the GPL for selling a GNU/Linux-based system to some of their customers, and now that they're giving the rest of the boxes to the customers (sort of by default), they are still in violation of the GPL. There are no GPL notices anywhere in the system, unless you connect by a serial console (I can give you pinouts, and maybe a password or two) -- then you'll get the login: prompt.

I don't think a lawsuit is going to do a whole lot of good. But I think if anyone tried to acquire USDTV's IP and sue someone or a website doing hacking on the box, they'd make SCO look like a profitable venture. What is it with Utah businesses?!

Ask them nicely, sue them if they don't comply

[Anonymous Coward]

It's plain copyright infringement. They wouldn't get away with it if they infringed on Microsoft's copyright. There's no reason to let them get away with it if they infringe on the copyright of thousands of Linux contributors.

Gouged?

[ClamIAm]

Perhaps the submitter has never read the GPL, but the license does, in fact, allow you to charge money when people request copies of the code. In fact, for a while Stallman made a living selling copies of Emacs by mail-order; there are plenty of sites that sell CDs of Linux distributions as well.

Re:Gouged?

[RealSurreal]

Close but no cigar. 1) There's no requirement to make the source freely available anywhere. You can release software under the GPL and charge whatever you like for a copy. The requirement is that whoever buys a copy from you with a GPL license receives the rights to redistribute it under a GPL license - which means they can then give it away for free (as long as the recipient is bound by the GPL too) 2) Nope. http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html#DoesTheGP LAllowDownloadFee Oh and Firefox is distributed under the Mozilla Public License not the GPL.

Re:What about other licenses?

[AJWM]

They couldn't release the code and they couldn't not release the code either.

The solution to that is to stop distributing anything. If you end up with a warehouse full of settop boxes you can't legally (because of copyright) distribute/sell, that's your tough luck for not doing due diligence on your business plan.

Same goes for any successors in interest to the defunct company.

Not sure, but..

[Jim Hall]

Looking at the links provided in TFA, it's hard to find the real violation here. For example, the link to HiSense quotes an email (March 2006) from the technical lead at USDTV, responding to a user request for copies of the source per the GNU GPL. He states that he would be happy to put up the files for download via a (web?) server, but they were moving offices and didn't have a box to use. Lame, but looks to be in good faith. Until they could put up a server, the technical lead listed the (unmodified?) software components covered by the GNU GPL:

• Linux kernel version 2.4.18
• glibc version 2.2.4
• libpthread version 0.9
• busybox version 0.60.0
• GNU tar 1.13.19
• gzip version 1.3

There is then a mention on the site (not part of the email) that the company has since hit financial problems, possibly implying they are going out of business. In fact, USDTV did go under. Technically, a violation of the GNU GPL for not providing the source on demand, but would be hard to bring to court. Especially since USDTV is out of business now. :-P

Under the GNU GPL, a developer who modifies or distributes code under the GNU GPL is required to redistribute the source code, "for a charge no more than your cost of physically performing source distribution". However, a program that is separate from the GNU GPL code (for example, a program that runs on top of the Linux kernel) is not bound by the GNU GPL. So they company isn't bound by anything to release code or binaries to their subscriber box software. And in any case, $30 could be a reasonable fee for physical distribution, since they are sending a field rep to your home - if they were distributing source code to the GNU GPL components (which doesn't appear to be the case.)

Reading through the (long!) forum, the company appears to be distributing an updated kernel and their own subscriber box software updates - from a USB "key" (I assume a USB fob or somesuch.) Forum members report they haven't been able to read the USB key on a PC. I didn't go through all 19 web pages of comments, but I didn't see anyone complaining about trying to get the source code.

So after much searching, it appears the submitted article is someone complaining they aren't getting upgraded TV software for free, and using the GNU GPL as leverage in their argument. Am I missing something???

I'm not sure this is the case.

[raehl]

Where is the act of infringment?

The GPL requires that IF you distribute code, you also have to distribute source code, and the person you give that code to can then also redistribute it under the same terms.

But, if I give you code, and you change it, and then you don't give it to anyone, guess what, you don't have to give the source code out at all.

So, in this case, who owns the receivers? If the cable company owned the receivers, and were just leasing them to the customers, I don't see that there's any infringement taking place. They're not distributing the software (it's on their hardware), so they're not obligated to distribute the source either.

Now, if they SOLD the boxes to the end consumer, then they'd be obligated to distribute the source, but is that the case here? Or did people just end up with abandoned receivers when the cable company went out of business?