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Final Draft of GPLv3 Allows Novell-Microsoft Deal
famicommie writes "All of Novell's fingernail biting has been for naught. In a display of forgiveness and bridge building on behalf of the FSF, ZDNet reports that the final draft of the GPLv3 will close the infamous MS-Novell loophole while allowing deals made previously to continue. From the article: 'The final, last-call GPLv3 draft bans only future deals for what it described as tactical reasons in a 32-page explanation of changes. That means Novell doesn't have to worry about distributing software in SLES that's governed by the GPLv3 ... Drafting the new license has been a fractious process, but Eben Moglen, the Columbia University law school professor who has led much of the effort, believes consensus is forming. That agreement is particularly important in the open-source realm, where differing license requirements can erect barriers between different open-source projects.'"
So does that mean TiVo can continue to sell their products because their deal was made before GPL3 was drafted?
Yes it's an anecdote! Were you expecting original research in a Slashdot comment?
Eben Moglen's (and FSF's) stance on this issue seems to be that the language of GPLV3 will automatically cause all GPLV3 software distributed by Novell in SLES to be protected by the Microsoft-Novell deal. Now, IANAL, but Eben Moglen is. I'm not sure he's 100% right, but I'm also not sure he's 100% wrong either. I wonder if that would hold up in court?
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This story is from 4th June... Another great bit of Slashdot editing.
This affects "GPLv2 or later" projects that can't be relicensed because some of the contributors can't be reached.
For new projects, or if all the developers agree, or for new contributions to existing projects, you can strike the clause permitting earlier deals if you like.
Good. Despite my displeasure with the MS/Novell deal, I think it's best not to create in-fighting within a community that has worked so hard to get where it is in the market. Divide and conquer is an old trick.
All these stuff about free software, people acting together and stuff, are, despite the turmoil and bickering, maybe because everything moves forward in spite of the turmoil and bickering, filling me with much hope.
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This seems a bit foolish to me. By not locking out the MS-Novell and other deals, it's as if they're being rewarded for weakning open source.
Dear diary: Today I stuffed some dolls full of dead rats I put in the blender.
Seriously, every day I'm more and more unhappy with the GPLv3. We have four big problems, which are digital restrictions management, patents, tivoization, and trap deals. The GPLv3 was about preventing these problems from happening, or at least, from affecting us. Yet right now it barely solves one of them. With every new revision, the GPLv3 got more and more fagged up, to the point it's now a stupid overhyped version of GPLv2 with little to no improvement, a pointless license.
Now I'll consider relesing my stuff with my own license that will address these issues, and I encourage others to do likewise. And, for the things where GPL will suffice, I'll stay with GPLv2, because GPLv3 is just not worth it.
I was about to say 13256278887989457651018865901401704640, but it appears this number is private property.
I've two open source projects that I'm working on, and both are either going to be released GPLv2 or maybe even BSD. I might even contemplate, gasp, Public Domain. Once you make the mental leap that you are going to be giving your software away, then, what difference does it make how you do so? I really don't want to spend too much time worrying that someone might make money with my stuff when I know that I won't.
The GPL is sorta irrelevant in a way. Any more, open source can mean any number of licenses. If people want to see the source code for my thing, they can always come to my web site. The odds of someone making a closed source product out of my code are probably rarer than the odds of me getting rich writing shareware for Windows, so what difference does it really make?
I just don't see the need for this license at all.
This is my sig.
The text the article is referring to is unchanged since the earlier drafts, and it certainly doesn't get novell off the hook wrt the linked article - Microsoft may still well have to lean on them to stop them shipping gplv3 code - since the use of the coupons, whilst existing as an effect of the patent agreement, will cause, when useed, a new contract between the coupon issuer [microsoft and novell] and the redeemer [joe bloggs] to be created at the date of redemption. If the code joe bloggs recieves contains gpl3'd code, then under the current draft (and as indicated in tfa) any patent protection indemities offered by that contract will automatically be extended to everybody. Thats why there was the fuss after poeple noted there isn't an expiry date on the coupons - up till that point it was thought they would all be gone by the time gplv3 was out and suse would be fine. Conclusion: either the summariser is misinformed or a turfer. for further info, go have a browse through groklaw. They have had pretty good coverage of it.
"Success is based on knowing how far to go in going too far"
Tactics are exactly the answer here - the FSF has a history of making tactical compromises. The FSF's process has no more been compromised over this than it was when they decided to release the LGPL and license GNU libc under it.
-- The act of censorship is always worse than whatever is being censored. Always.
All the GPLv3 language does is make merely having entered into the deal not per se a violation of the license. It does not exempt the company from any of the other terms of the license, including the requirement that all recipients receive not merely the protections resulting from any agreement but the right to pass along those protections in turn. So Novell is still on the hook there: as soon as they're faced with GPLv3'd software in their distribution they'll have to decide whether or not they can extend the agreement with Microsoft to cover all Linux users, not just those who got their software directly from Novell. If they can't, then distribution subject to the agreement would still be a violation of the GPLv3 even with the grandfather clause in there.
You're forbidden to use copyrighted code in any application.
" In a display of forgiveness and bridge building..."
What are you willing to bet that it would read quite like that if it were Microsoft displaying the forgiveness?
You are attempting to read sigs. Cancel or Allow?
You're either ignorant or trolling.
... actually whatever the fuck you want. The GPL exists so that other people can distribute your code with certain limitations. The BSD license does the same thing, just with different restrictions.
The GPL tells you nothing about what you have to do with your code. The GPL tells you what you have to do with other people's code. In fact, BSD-style licenses are the same way.
The GPL and BSD license are both distribution licenses. If you own the copyright on your code, you can distribute it however you like. You can GPL it, then close the source later, relicense, dual licence