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Legal Summits to Tackle Linux
An anonymous reader writes "BuilderAU has the story that the Linux Foundation, custodians of the Linux trademark, have announced that they will host two summits to deal with legal issues surrounding Linux and open-source software. Attendance at the first summit will be restricted to members of the Linux Foundation and their legal counsel. The second summit — an open meeting — will be held in Autumn 2008 where legal experts from any background will be able to attend."
the spirit of the GPL was to keep software free so that the source code can't be made proprietary ... The only anti-GPL statements I've seen him make are in regards to GPLv3, in that he doesn't think a software license should govern or have anything to do with hardware.
From TFA: The Linux Foundation was created in 2007 by the merger of the Open Source Development Labs and the Free Standards Group. It sponsors the work of Linus Torvalds and counts companies such as Google, HP, IBM, Intel and Novell among its members.
What have these companies done to advance the spirit of GPL in Linux?
Google : Has made full use of the community built code and made proprietary extensions; without contributing a single bit; since they aren't distributing it.
HP : The company which kicked Bruce Perens out, built winprinters and winmodems on their Windows PCs, kindly took over Compaq and destroyed their Unix offerings.
IBM: Despite the SCO fiasco, they still maintain both AIX and Linux offerings, and have not clearly indicated which way they will go. Also, they are behind TCPA, TPM chips and DRM as well.
Novell : Need I say more? They provoked a version upgrade to the GPL2 by their sleazy dealings and destroyed a decent distro, namely SuSE. After kindly enacting a suicide of their own Novell Netware.
With friends like this in the Linux Foundation, and a clueless Linus at the top, does Linux need any enemies?
If you keep throwing chairs, one day you'll break windows....
Perhaps the idiot who modded the parent troll would care to explain his views? As an AC if he wants to preserve his mod points? When we hear Linux, we think of RedHat, Mandrivia, the LAMP stack etc. Not HP, not Novell, not Google. These companies would do their utmost to ensure Linux and PCs remained non-free. I was not trolling.
If you keep throwing chairs, one day you'll break windows....
Remember folks, Linux himself stated that the kernel is HIS and as such, he excersises a tyrany over it. There is some debate about features and such but his decisions are final or in other words the buck stops there.
Mod me up/Mod me down: I wont frown as I've no crown
"tool in the struggle" nope, no zealotry here.