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TiVo Says It Could Suffer Under GPLv3

Posted by kdawson on from the no-prevention-of-hacking dept.

Preedit writes to tell us that those busy folks over at InformationWeek have been scrutinizing yet more SEC filings, and Novell and Microsoft aren't the only ones concerned about certain provisions in the final draft of GPLv3. TiVo worries too. The problem is that TiVo boxes are Linux-based. They're also designed to shut down if the software is hacked by users trying to circumvent DRM features. But GPLv3 would prohibit TiVo's no-tamper setup. "If the currently proposed version of GPLv3 is widely adopted, we may be unable to incorporate future enhancements to the GNU/Linux operating system into our software, which could adversely affect our business," TiVo warns in a regulatory filing cited by InformationWeek."

2 of 710 comments (clear)

  1. There's a simple solution by melted · · Score: 0, Redundant

    Use FreeBSD. Or any other BSD for that matter. There isn't anything in Linux that makes it Tivo's only choice. If GPL V3 gets pushed onto commercial users of Linux (Google, Amazon, others), they'll just switch to *BSD within a year, tops.

  2. Re:Could be good news for BSD projects by Professor_UNIX · · Score: 1, Redundant

    That depends on your definition of free, doesn't it.
    The ironic thing is that at the end of the day, the BSD license is more "free" than the GPL in that it allows you to do whatever you want with the code, including bundling it in with proprietary code and not releasing your enhancements. It sucks for the original authors, but they released their code under that license fully acknowledging companies had permission to take their work and build on it without giving anything back. That is "free", but not necessary conducive to building communities obviously.