GPL Code Found In OpenBSD Wireless Driver

NormalVisual writes "The mailing lists were buzzing recently when Michael Buesch, one of the maintainers for the GPL'd bc43xx Broadcom wireless chip driver project, called the OpenBSD folks to task for apparently including code without permission from his project in the OpenBSD bcw project, which aims to provide functionality with Broadcom wireless chips under that OS. It seems that the problem has been resolved for now with the BSD driver author totally giving up on the project and Theo De Raadt taking the position that Buesch's posts on the subject were 'inhuman.'" More commentary from the BSD community is over at undeadly.org.

Comments

Well, Theo is something of an asshat

[MrHanky]

One should never expect him to see the other side of an issue.

Re:Well, Theo is something of an asshat

[n6mod]

This left me to think that when Theo commits social gaffes, it is not his fault and he can't help himself.

Though, it is important to know your limitations. In particular, you'd think that he should remain silent on the social gaffes of others.

It's pretty hard to take criticism of interpersonal skills from Theo seriously.

Re:Well, Theo is something of an asshat

[ShieldW0lf]

Some people don't give a fuck. That's a decision.

To make it out to be some psychological issue or some such nonsense dismisses the choices of those who made the decision to give a shit about other people and not be an asshole.

Skip the third party apologies, call it what it is and accept it or don't accept it.

Re:Well, Theo is something of an asshat

[slashdot.org]

Theo is a real sharp programmer, and an eloquent writer when he wants to be. I met him once. I went to shake his hand. I swear, he did not notice. This left me to think that when Theo commits social gaffes, it is not his fault and he can't help himself. We all have our lacks, issues, and strengths.

What Theo did was a classic case of blame shifting. Trivialize the problems on your side whilst (trying to) change the subject to a problem on the other side. I don't understand why no-one brought this up in the discussion earlier, it's very transparent. All the -public- name calling demonstrates it nicely because it's basically committing the same 'crime'. Eye for an eye I don't think is considered terribly humane.

Now the interesting thing to me is the way they tried to trivialize the copyright infringement. Supposedly the code should have never made it into CVS, it was a mistake. However, it was being used to develop the driver for BSD (and to be licensed under the BSD license).

When corporations do stuff like this, they generally use clean-room reverse-engineering. I wonder what the legality is of the approach they used, copyright-wise. Consider a more extreme case. Let's say I take the Linux kernel source tree, and one by one I start 'rewriting' every bit of source (while most certainly glancing at the original), could I then license the 'new' kernel under whatever terms I want?

I could be wrong, but wasn't the copyright violation being made when the code is copied from the GPL code into the local development version of the developer? And the CVS commit is just a wider spread distribution after that? I've wondered about this for a while because 'tainting' is practically only being talked about in the context of closed-source corporations, not in the context of someone having seen Open Source software.

Re:Well, Theo is something of an asshat

[seebs]

You know, the funny thing is, right now, you're the one making a decision to be an asshole rather than giving a shit about other people.

As one of the people who doesn't notice when people are trying to shake my hand sometimes, I can assure you, it's not that I don't care about people; it's that I don't have the same raw inputs to my decision-making that some people do. So far as I'm concerned, you people all have telepathy. I know it's not technically telepathy, but it might as well be; I have no access to the medium through which you pick up on things like that.

So, I put in serious time and effort doing my best to read people, and people like you bitch me out because I don't do it perfectly, because it's effortless for you.

The irony is that it's your empathy that is leading you to a lack of empathy in this situation.

Re:Well, Theo is something of an asshat

[Hal_Porter]

I don't really buy this any more. I do lots of work with customers, and introversion would be suicidal for me career-wise. I'm not too social by default, I basically taught myself to fake it. But I've met a lot of people who are basically lazy and rationalize it with the old line about how they're "probably somewhere on the autistic spectrum". But guess what, they end up earning a shitty salary and being put somewhere in the basement doing tech support, badly. In my current company, most of those guys got the boot when internal tech support got outsourced. And then they moaned about how the management never understood how valuable to the company they were. Truly autistic people are seriously disabled, and these people just weren't.

It's a free country and it's your choice, unless you really have some kind of disability. But humans are social animals and if you choose not to play the game, don't be too surprised if you lose by default.

Theo is an idiot

[Anonymous Coward]

His team were caught red-handed, and had the gall to blame the people who got ripped. He doesn't even seem to get copyright, saying there was no infringement because the driver wasn't yet ready for general use is beyond moronic.

Re:Theo is an idiot

[Score Whore]

He was very civil. What he was not was quiet or non-embarrassing. Theo's reaction is clearly an attempt to direct attention from the facts of the situation and the poor behavior of a member of the openbsd team.

Re:I am amazed

[lbbros]

Yes, but according to the licenses involved (in this case the GPL).

Overreactions...

[rthille]

Deanna (I think it was Deanna anyway, based on the contributed by) overreacted to the email. The only thing unreasonable about the email that I saw was the wide distribution. The initial email from Michael Buesch, IMHO, should have gone to the comitter and the OpenBSD core team...

Re:Overreactions...

[ScrewMaster]

Yes, and you could tell from Theo's initial response that it was that wide distribution that really torqued him into a pretzel. Nobody likes having their dirty laundry aired in public (it immediately alienates the very people with which you are trying to communicate: as a tactic it should be a last resort) and it is that massive CC list that makes me ponder what Mr. Buesch's real motive could have been. From a practical standpoint, if he'd just wanted to resolve the issue he should have done what you said. Instead, he managed to turn a simple request into a two-day running conflict.

Maybe this is just an example of two developers with limited social skills stepping on each others toes. I don't know, it sure looks that way to me. Wouldn't be the first time I've seen something like this, that's for sure. Programmers are people too.

My favorite part...

[mg2]

...is how you can scroll down past the cascade of de Raadt nonsense and find an actual reasonable response from the bcw maintainer himself!

Unfortunately, with so much noise coming from de Raadt, the only thing most people are going to see are his ridiculous responses.

I'm sure someone else has drawn this line before, but he reminds me of the OpenBSD mascot. Like a blowfish, he fills up with (hot) air when threatened and is very defensive.

Straw man attacks and ad hominem from Theo

[SuperBanana]

If you read through the email conversation, you'll see a VERY diplomatic initial message from Michael, a straw-man attack from Theo ("Do you feel that Marcus should give up his efforts?"), a VERY reasonable response ("No, he should _not_ give up. The opposite is true. He should start to contact us to get relicensing permission from us to speed up bcw development and stay legal") and then profanity and rage from Theo.

The slashdot post, the weblog entry, and Theo's comments are all ad hominem, and baseless ad hominem at that- the core issue here is that GPL code was taken in violation of its license. The owner of the code contacted and admittedly large number of people, publicly, about it. It is hardly out of line given Theo's well-known grandstanding full of rhetoric (hardware drivers for OpenBSD come to mind.)

Michael pointed out the violation and asked the developer/OpenBSD people to contact him to work out relicensing the code. Instead, Theo attacked him relentlessly and repeatedly. After the first 6 posts between Theo and Michael, I felt sick and stopped reading.

Re:Straw man attacks and ad hominem from Theo

[SuperBanana]

Reputation and respect are insanely important to most developers and being accused in public of stealing someone's stuff is damaging. Theo is responding with an appropriate amount of emotion if you ask me.

The proper response is to defend yourself against the claim, not attack the person; logical fallacies may be motivated by emotion, but that does not make use of a logical fallacy legitimate or justified. That's the entire point behind ad hominem attacks and other logical fallacies. They're poisoned arguments. Even if you have a legitimate claim, using logical fallacies in front of people who realize what's going, gives them the distinct impression that you don't have any legitimate arguments in your defense at all.

This is the worst possible offense in open source

[defile]

Copying code without permission is the worst possible offense in open source land. His righteous indignation is absolutely justified. The appropriate response is "Our deepest and most sincere apologies. The code has been removed. Thank you for deciding not to seek any further retribution."

Arguing over not being nice about calling out this offense is cowardly and sociopathic. e.g. playing politics.

Re:The BSD folks seem to be whiners

[Omega996]

eh, a lot of whining on both sides occurred - the whole thing could definitely have been handled much more professionally and politely by both sides. Buesch could've contacted Glocker privately via email and asked him to remove the copyrighted material from CVS, and encouraged him to contact the copyright holders-in-question if he were interested in obtaining assistance in getting his bcw driver to work. It's called giving him "the benefit of the doubt."
The interests of expediency (notifying Glocker and the other copyright holders, as well as people who did the reverse-engineering (wtf? why? I still can't figure that one out)) didn't serve either group's PR interests. Now people are lining up on the tired BSD/ISC vs. GPL battlefront again, fighting over something that only involves a few developers. I don't think Glocker should've committed that GPL nonsense into CVS, but I do think he should've been given a chance privately to correct his mistake. All this hassle and stupid flamewar because simple politeness was dispensed with. Gad, I'm glad I don't work on anything involving these groups.

Re:I am amazed

[Bruce Perens]

but GPL limits with whom you can share

When you share, and the other party does not, that is not sharing any longer. That is a gift. It always entertains me that the people who protest that they are most deserving of gifts of source code from the community are those who refuse to share theirs.

Bruce

Here's why

[nedwidek]

GPL does not allow someone to pick up the code and turn it into a closed source product.
BSD does. BSD code can be included into a GPL project, but the reverse is not true.

So the GPL product works hard to create a Broadcomm driver. The code gets included into a BSD driver. Broadcomm picks up the BSD driver and includes it into their closed source product. Broadcomm or some other company benefits from the GPL code and does not honor the orignal license.

Re:Summary: Theo went over the top

[rben]

I think this might have been handled better, but mostly on the BSD side. If they'd "borrowed" code from a corporation, their first notification might have been a lawsuit, not a widely distributed posting.

It's no surprise that stuff like this gets blown up out of proportion. Quite a few people who work in software, myself included, aren't the most diplomatic types. Still, maturity is ignoring other peoples bad behavior and trying to work out your differences amicably. I think Marcus showed a great deal of restraint. I would have been incredibly angry if I'd been in his situation and I'm not sure I'd have been nearly so forgiving.

While it maybe a tempest in a teapot, it's a lesson for all of us. We all look like doofuses (how do you spell the plural of doofus?) when we air our grievances in public.

Take a breath, relax, go have a beer. Then find a way to work together.

My 1.9888888 cents worth.

Re:The war against BSD continues

[mbuesch]

This isn't an issue of his code being copied exactly (a straight copyright violation), instead it's an issue of a certain amount of code in an as yet non-working driver being too derivative of a copyrighted product. Did you actually try to compare both projects? You'll be surprised how much copied code you will find.

Re:sad

[Anonymous Coward]

As usual, the zealots jump to conclusions without reading everything. Yes, and to give you credit, at least you're admitting it. I doubt even Theo would make such an admission about himself.

The driver is deleted. Issue resolved. Try this: grab someone's copyrighted code, and distribute it in violation of the license. Then when they drag you into court, just say "oh, I've deleted it now, issue resolved" and see how far that gets you.

The point that Theo and gang are upset about is that Michael decided to take this whole thing public No, that's the excuse that Theo is using. The real reason that Theo is upset is that he got caught with his pants down.

The reason this was brought up in public is because it's public code. The OSS development model means that everything is public. If Theo doesn't want public discussions about public code, he should not be involved in development which involves everything happening in public.

Theo's excuse that "oh, it should have been done privately" is a smokescreen to try to distract people from the fact that someone on his team got caught violating copyright. It embarrassed him, and he got pissy about it.

Re:Summary: Theo went over the top

[Bruce Perens]

You know, it's OK to use a GPL driver in BSD code. It causes a phenomenon that the BSD folks really hate, though, which is that the GPL applies to the entire product. But that would have been fine for temporary development. The real problem was the lack of proper attribution of the copyright and license. I see no way for the Linux developer to have rectified that lack other than through a public notice, because it would not have been proper for anyone to be left thinking his code was under the BSD license. It was his right to say publicly that it was not. Perhaps he could have contacted Theo privately and gotten him to do so. But given people who react the way Theo sometimes does, I think the best protection one can have is to do everything in the open where others can see.

Bruce

I'm glad I don't work on OpenBSD

[wrook]

Wah... What the hell? The author of some code contacts the OpenBSD to communicate that copyright was infringed upon. The OpenBSD guys explode in a series of "zealot" name calling. I guess I can see some sense in privately contacting the OpenBSD dev. But on the other hand, it's in the OpenBSD development tree. Probably it's a good idea to tell people that it shouldn't be there.

Reading the initial email, I can't find any hint of malice. Just expressing the facts and offering to provide a license for the code. If this mailing list blows up because of something so unbelievably trivial, it doesn't seem like a fun place to hang out in. It's just weird.

But something else bothers me about the response too. It seems like the people there are *upset* that the original person informed them of the copyright infringement. I mean, nobody denied it. Everyone seems to agree there was an infringement. It just seems that some of the OpenBSD people think that the Linux people are assholes for choosing to license their code under the GPL... And apparently it's even worse to ask people not to infringe on that license.

That's just bizarre... It kind of makes you wonder who the zealots are... Personally, I'm kind of neutral on the subject. I like the GPL in some instances, I like other licenses in other instances. But, I just can't quite wrap my head around BSD guys (of all people) taking such a strange stance...

Re:Summary of the Facts

[glasn0st]

I seriously cannot believe this. Why should the discussion focus on shooting the messenger? A developer was caught infringing on copyrights pants down. The infringement is hard to do without intent. Would you deal with such a "rogue" developer privately, or send a mail to project mailinglists (perhaps a core or dev list) which likely would be public anyway? Maybe OpenBSD would mail people privately, but can you not understand that others decide otherwise? If your developer makes these kinds of mistakes, the issue WILL be public and you WILL have to make a statement sooner or later.

Transparency on copyright issues is just as important as transparency on security. It serves as an example to all open source projects to be watchful about these issues. This is not only about OpenBSD. OpenBSD is a mature open source project and they have nothing to be insecure (huhuh) about. Sometimes OpenBSD may have exploits, sometimes it may have copyright issues. We live, we learn. Code-wise this is a small issue and it's a fixable issue, as the bc43xx developers said in their statement.

I find the approach of the bc43xx developers perfectly defendable. The first mail was clear, diplomatic, complete, and explicitly offers to work out a deal. That's more than you usually get when you infringe on someone's rights! Unfortunately, the only result of it was another episode of "the Theo Show". Even though the issue was broadcasted, the OpenBSD project still had a great immediate opportunity to contain the issue. Instead, the bc43xx developers doesn't receive much but irrational unconstructive replies, intentional misinterpretation, blaming people for OpenBSD's own developer's decisions, etcetera.

If going public with an issue is inhuman, how is turning the debate into a flamefest human? It was shameful to read. The Theo Show IS the public spectacle. Perhaps it is part of how he defines his personality. In fact, this rogue attitude seems to work for OpenBSD - OpenBSD regularly gets a lot of mainstream exposure from these kind of fights. Maybe it's what saving OpenBSD from becoming irrelevant. Well, good for them. They probably make a great OS (I use FreeBSD exclusively). It's just too bad that they haven't got a Broadcom driver. :)

Re:sad

[dhasenan]

'Inhuman' hardly describes being open about copyright violation. Michael was polite in his initial message; the immediate responses were to flame him. It's hard to accidentally include someone else's driver code in yours; Theo still kept saying that it was clearly an accident.

As for leaving GPL stub code...it would have been difficult to fully audit the driver code to see how much needed to be rewritten. Probably some GPL code would have stayed in the driver through release.

But since Michael was able to discover his code in the bcw driver, it was being distributed. *That's* clearly illegal. If only a few people had CVS access and nobody was actively distributing the bcw driver, then Michael wouldn't have had a case, or even known about it. They didn't even take that step with a non-working driver. I have no sympathy for the bcw maintainers.

Re:Summary: Theo went over the top

[Bogtha]

commiting to cvs is not and has never been distribution.

So if I strip out all the copyright notices from a Vista ISO and commit it to a public CVS repository, it doesn't count as copyright infringement or plagiarism? And I won't have to worry about a nasty lawsuit from Microsoft?

Re:Summary: Theo went over the top

[Eric S. Smith]

Now I don't personally know what kind of development you've been involved in but commiting to cvs is not and has never been distribution.

If it wasn't being distributed, how was it discovered? Yes, I know, how mean of me to ask.

On top of that it was a few minor functions and variable names used as placeholders.

"Didn't do it, and it wasn't wrong, and anyway, it wasn't serious!"

To put it bluntly, the BSD folks don't want or need viral code polluting their systems.

It was good enough to inpsire the developer, to take Saint Theo's interpretation.

Was he totally justified? You're damn straight he was.

"Just let us rip you off in peace! GPL sucks anyway!"

You have got to be kidding

[Rumagent]

> From: Marcus Glocker
> To: source-changes@
> Date: Thu, 5 Apr 2007 10:25:25 -0600 (MDT)
> Subject: CVS: cvs.openbsd.org: src
[cut:cvs log]
> Log message:
> After been attacked by Michael Buesch because we initially
> were using some of their routines in the bcw driver, I decided to stop
> working on it. To avoid any further license chit chat I plain drop the
> driver.
>
> ***
>
> Happy now?
>
> It's a pleasure to see how the OpenSource community stands together,
> and starting public wars instead of talking directly to the people
> involved.

I don't understand your reaction, really.
If you were really interrested in doing a Broadcom wireless driver for
openbsd, you would have chosen the option to relicense some code (and
therefore drop only that code which I refuse to relicense), which I gave
you.

It's a pity. I'd like you to sleep a night over this and rethink
your decision tomorrow.
Feel free to contact us to get code relicensed _before_ you re-add
it to the repository. This will make you and us happy and I'm sure
you'll have a working driver soon.

Not only in this, but in thread in general Michael Buesch shows remarkable restraint. He is the one with a legitimate grievance and he is being insulted ad infinitum.

This is not a matter of GPL vs. BSD. It is a simple matter of breach of copyright. Everything else is bullshit.

Re:You have got to be kidding

[mbuesch]

And how would have this been handled if it had been IBM ? If they also distributed it in public? Exactly the same way. Distribute in public -> complain in public. The public has the right to get informed that the code thei're looking at is _not_ BSD licensed, like the source header says.

Re:Summary: Theo went over the top

[Bruce Perens]

Now I don't personally know what kind of development you've been involved in but commiting to cvs is not and has never been distribution.

Oh? So, if I take my record collection and commit it to a public CVS repository, that's going to be OK with RIAA, then? :-)

Placing code in a source code repository that is accessable for download by any other legal entity is distribution the moment the first download, or even source-code-browse, occurrs. The fact that it is CVS does not make it the slightest bit different from being a regular public web server.

Also, it is not necessary for the code to be "released" for it to be distribution. Remember Corel, who thought they didn't have to comply with the GPL as long as it was a beta test?

The Linux developer had the right to make a public notice that the posted license and copyright statement were not his copyright statement and the correct license. Otherwise, someone, anyone, could have made unlicensed derivative works of his code without knowing any better. A public notice protects unwitting victims like that, as well as the copyright owner.

Bruce

Ah, a GPL vs BSD flamewar, FINALLY!

[SmallFurryCreature]

Insulting windows users just ain't any fun to us seasoned opensource users is it. It is like trying your wits against a duckling, one that has been run over and chewed on by the rats. Far better to cross daggers with a person of your own calibre, even if in the case of you BSD lovers it is an undead calibre.

But very well, I shall engage you on the battlefield, as long as you promise to stay down wind of me.

BSD is the thief and the thief does NOT get to complain about how the victim responds. If you break into my house I am not obliged to send you a polite letter first to ask you to please return my stuff, I send for the police, I do that publicaly and if they wake up everyone in your street and haul you out in front of your neightbours in your Steve Jobs underwear while they go about reclaiming my possesions then all the better.

The BSD people involved really should have known better then to do this. Contrary to what some people think both BSD and GPL people strongly believe in copyrights (what differs from closed source supporters is just how much control the author has over the user and/or further authors). You may not like either the GPL or BSD BUT for either to work they must respect the other.

Buesch might have done this in private BUT it is his decision and his decision and alone how to handle this. The offenders do not get to dictate how the victim voices his complaint. Theo should shut the fuck up, apologize for his and his team actions and be damned glad no formal complaint is being launched in the courts.

Just how much code is there in BSD anyway that is not there legally? Were there is smoke, there is fire.

Re:I am amazed

[Bruce Perens]

Sharing does not imply contributing to a commons.

You can share with groups as well as individuals. The main difference is that sharing with an individual can be regulated closely - if that person doesn't share in return, you know never to share with that person again and can enforce a social penalty for not sharing. With a group, you need rules to do that, and possibly more than just social mechanisms to enforce them.

Bruce

Okay, lets translate it to beer

[SmallFurryCreature]

GPL: I buy everyone a round because the license of the bar says that everyone else will also buy a round when it is their turn.

BSD: I buy everyone a round because hell, I am just a nice guy and I want everyone to have a beer even if that means I will end up paying for all the beer being drunk.

Closed source company: Hell, I like you BSD, keep them coming.Eh, my round? I left my wallet at home, say BSD, how about a napeleon brandy mate?

BSD: Sure, we are all mates.

GPL: You are an idiot BSD. But hey, make mine a double.

Get it?

Re:Summary of the Facts

[AndrewM1]

Sorry, but when someone's called on you to explain seemingly-illegally-copied code, telling them to "go fuck themselves" is not a bloody option. Try that in the real world sometime, and see how fast an indictment for copyright infringement and the corresponding civil suit comes flying in.

Also, you say he "kill[ed] a truly free implementation of the driver in question," you are totally missing the issue. The entire point of this debate is that the bloody driver wasn't free at all! It was GPL'd code, which gives you the rights to use it within the terms of the GPL. Stripping the legitimate author(s) name(s) from the code and relicensing it under a looser (or, in the case of the GPL, tighter) license is one of the main things the GPL and other licenses are designed to prevent.

I find it regrettable that Michael decided to go so public with this (indeed, as others pointed out, it could probably have been solved privately) but it is absolutely his right, as the "sorry little fuck" who owns the copyright on the code, to protect it as he sees fit. I think the OpenBSD team should be remarkably relieved that Michael diplomatically approached the issue and offered to assist in relicensing the code instead of simply suing Marcus and the other perpetrators of this infringement.

So stop heaping abuse on the guy simply because he chose to protect his legal right to have his original product (the code) used only under the license he selected for it and to not have it used outside those boundaries by anyone else, whether by accident or design. Instead, give him credit for offering to assist in reaching a constructive solution to the issue.

-- Andrew Morritt

Irrelevant . . .

[Dausha]

This is a problem of the FOSS community turning on itself. If there was a GPL violation, the proper thing to do is own up to it and seek a re-license, which is what the owner of the GPL'd code wanted.

I am still reading the whole Gmain thread, and am quite shocked by Theo's comments. I agree with another fellow who said that FOSS wireless driver development teams should work closely together to ensure the proprietary world doesn't overwhelm the effort. But, I digress . . .

The core issue is whether the BCW developer copied GPL'd code, which the holder of the GPL copyright asserts. Plenty of clean examples were given, and the ability to investigate the entire tree for both sets of code makes it a quick search issue. Much better than the SCO/M$ v. IBM suit. Theo's response to the allegation is immature at least:

1. Ad hominem attacks: calling Mike inhuman and attacking him for making the issue public.
2. Irrelevant: saying that the bcw code does not work so there's no copyright issue. Copyright speaks to content, not functionality.
3. It was an accident: Claiming the bcw "accidentally" copied GPL'd code. How can you accidentally copy entire blocks of code?
4. That the code copy was temporary scaffolding: which counters #3, above. You can't claim the code copy was an accident or unintentional then say the copy was intentional for a short period of time. Theo says the code was copied to get other parts of the bcw driver to work, then would be re-written. The problem here is twofold. First, the code was copied and checked into the repository under BSD licensing, which is a violation in-and-of-itself. Second, putting the code there pending re-write means the re-write would be a derivative of the original GPL'd code---which is still a copyright violation.

Above all, the entire line of discussion is not relevant. There's a claim of copyright violation. If the code is there, then it is a violation, whether or not it was "accidental." This extends beyond issues of header calls which are so ordinary as to not be copyrightable. (At least, under U.S. law, if there are only a few ways to convey an idea, then it cannot be copyrighted.) Whether the accusation was public is not relevant; was there a violation? The responsible action would be to investigate when the GPL'd author made the accusation.

Let's pretend MS is on one of the sides - decent?

[baryon351]

I feel saddened by some of this, the community fighting, but then I wonder if perhaps I'm just emotional, being both a GPL and BSD license supporter. Sometimes I like to move things around, to see how it works.

Below are two edits to the piece here.

The first. Let's pretend this was GPL code taken by Microsoft, not OpenBSD, for inclusion in Windows.

From: Michael Buesch <mb>
Subject: Microsoft bcw: Possible GPL license violation issues
Newsgroups: gmane.linux.kernel.wireless.general,
  gmane.linux.drivers.bcm54xx.devel
To: Marcus Glocker <mglocker>,
        Jon Simola <jsimola>,
        Theo de Raadt <deraadt>,
        Stefano Brivio <stefano.brivio>,
        Martin Langer <martin>,
        Danny van Dyk <kugelfang>,
        Andreas Jaggi <andreas.jaggi>,
        Larry Finger <larry.finger>,
        Quaker.Fang
Cc: Johannes Berg <johannes>,
        Joseph Jezak <josejx>,
        John Linville <linville>,
        Greg kh <greg>,
        bcm43xx <list>,
        linux-wireless <list>,
        license-violation <list>
Date: Wed, 4 Apr 2007 22:08:13 +0200
User-Agent: Outlook Express
 
I, Michael Buesch, am one of the maintainers of the GPL'd Linux
wireless LAN driver for the Broadcom chip (bcm43xx).
The Copyright holders of bcm43xx (which includes me) want to talk
to you, developers of Microsoft Windows, about possible GPL license and therefore
Copyright violations in your bcw driver.

To me, that looks like Mr Buesch is being decent.

Now let's switch to the opposite - Mr Buesch as a Windows developer, finding Microsoft code in OpenBSD

From: Michael Buesch <mb>
Subject: OpenBSD bcw: Possible MS Windows license violation issues
Newsgroups: windows.kernel.wireless.general,
  windows.drivers.bcm54xx.devel
To: Marcus Glocker <mglocker>,
        Jon Simola <jsimola>,
        Theo de Raadt <deraadt>,
        Stefano Brivio <stefano.brivio>,
        Martin Langer <martin>,
        Danny van Dyk <kugelfang>,
        Andreas Jaggi <andreas.jaggi>,
        Larry Finger <larry.finger>,
        Quaker.Fang
Cc: Johannes Berg <johannes>,
        Joseph Jezak <josejx>,
        John Linville <linville>,
        Greg kh <greg>,
        bcm43xx <list>,
        windows-wireless <list>,
        license-violation <list>
Date: Wed, 4 Apr 2007 22:08:13 +0200
User-Agent: KMail/1.9.5
 
I, Michael Buesch, am one of the Managers of the Microsoft Windows
wireless LAN driver team for the Broadcom chip (bcm43xx).
The Copyright holder of bcm43xx (Microsoft) wants to talk
to you, OpenBSD bcw developers, about possible Microsoft Windows license and therefore
Copyright violations in your bcw driver.

Again, a response like that if it were from Microsoft to the OpenBSD team would be considered highly decent.

I think Michael Buesch did well

Re:Summary: Theo went over the top

[lendude]

Just how likely is it that yourself and the three others who modded this insightful didn't bother to actually acquire some knowledge of why the developer had that view? It's all explained in any number of places, including this post in the thread:

http://bsd.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=229865&cid =18648703

Re:Summary of the Facts

[Bruce Perens]

Michael,

As far as I can tell, it was your obligation to post publicly that the code was GPL licensed before someone else could have been damaged by making an assumption that the code was not GPL licensed.

If that project had a nice, empathic woman who has been a parent of teenagers to handle your notice, the reply would have been an apology, followed by amplification of your notice, and a calm talk about what to do. Instead, you got Theo :-)

It's as if you ran over a land-mine and people then tried to criticize you for running.

Bruce

Re:Summary of the Facts

[EveLibertine]

the real sticking point is that you didn't offer the man an attempt to remedy the situation privately and in good faith.

How is that a sticking point? The _only_ sticking point is the copied code. (Why people keep calling this theft is beyond me; infringement != theft)

Furthermore, imagine a scenario where this wasn't taken public ASAP. Anyone that went to the code after the copied code was added but before it was corrected would be liable to think that the code in question was under a completely different license. In this scenario it is in the author's best interest to notify as many people as possible that his code has been hijacked. The more people that know, the better it is for the author, and for the people who would potentially have used the code. Sure, you'll be stepping on a few toes in making the issue public, but it has to be done in order to protect yourself and everyone else from misappropriating code. There is *no* other way to accomplish this as effectively, that I am aware of. Why take the man to task for protecting his assets, kindly and tactfully at that? I'm not sure that we're reading the same thing, because from my end, it looks like Michael was being kinder and more patient than I can reasonably expect from anybody that I've ever met. The only alternative would be to ask the developer to make a *public* statement about the entire thing, which would have the same effect. The only difference would be the name of the person delivering the message, which is _completely_ trivial.

Maybe you could argue that it might have saved the developer some face if he was the one delivering the message publicly. You know what would have saved him even more face? Not relicensing code that wasn't his in the first place.

Re:Summary: Theo went over the top

[Eric S. Smith]

gives new meaning to the term GPL nazi's.

Dropping a politely-worded note proposing co-operative effort to a bunch of concerned parties? Yeah, you would need a new meaning for the word "Nazi" before you could use it to describe that.

What wacky world do Theo's enablers come from that they think it's an aggrieved party's duty to keep an offender's misdeeds secret?