Survey Says GPLv3 Is Shunned

willdavid writes in to note a survey of open source developers conducted by Evans Data that indicates a real rift in the community over GPLv3. The survey was based on in-depth interviews with 380 open source developers and no estimated margin of error was given. "Just 6 percent of developers working with open-source software have adopted the new GNU General Public License version 3... Also, two-thirds say they will not adopt GPLv3 anytime in the next year, and 43 percent say they will never implement the new license. Almost twice as many would be less likely to join a project that uses GPLv3 than would be likely to join... [Evans Data's CEO said] 'Developers are confused and divided about [the restrictions GPLv3 imposes], with fairly equal numbers agreeing with the restrictions, disagreeing with them, or thinking they will be unenforceable.'"

Comments

Slow adoption is to be expected

[A beautiful mind]

It is much easier for new projects to start out with GPLv3 than old projects to convert. Unless the committers transfer copyrights to a central body like in the case of the gnu tools and FSF, it is hard to move to another license if not bordering on impossible.

Re:Slow adoption is to be expected

[stinerman]

Not to mention any project with files licensed under GPLv2 or later is, for all intents and purposes, GPLv3 anyway.

Re:Slow adoption is to be expected

[hansonc]

wrong.

If I'm the user of the code e.g. Tivo and I don't decide that I want to comply with gpl v3 I don't have to in that case. For you to force me to comply with v3 you have to relicense it as v3 (or later) it's not a retroactive license which probably wouldn't be legally enforceable anyway.

Remember!

[heinousjay]

Those restrictions are for your freedom. It is important to take freedom away to protect it. Truly allowing freedom would allow freedom to be taken away, and we can't allow that, so we've taken away some freedom to allow true freedom to flourish.

I can't imagine why anyone wouldn't understand that perfectly.

And I'm sure I'll get modded down, but before you do that, read through my first paragraph carefully and tell me what I've said differently than the GNU people.

Re:Remember!

[cromar]

GPL protects the freedom of the code, not the freedom of the developer. Big difference! If you want developer freedom, use the BSD license or some such. Different tools for different problems :)

Re:Remember!

[maxwell demon]

It doesn't restrict hardware. You can make your hardware DRMed like hell. You just can't run GPLv3ed software on that DRMed hardware. That's a restriction on the software (don't run it on DRMed hardware).

Re:Remember!

[Bogtha]

I'm not sure if you are being sarcastic or not, but if you are, then please be aware that taking freedoms away to protect other freedoms is the basis of all law. You aren't free to hit me because you've had that freedom taken away from you.

Unless you are an anarchist, you really have no basis for criticising the GPL in this regard, because you agree with this logic applied to different areas.

Re:Remember!

[Ginger Unicorn]

it also doesn't restrict how you *run* it. Run it on DRMed hardware to your heart's content. It just specifies what information you must include should you wish to redistribute it.

Oh dear!

[mmcuh]

Oh dear! Another rift in the community, etc. Really, how many articles of this type have been posted to Slashdot in the last few weeks?

And the statement "Just 6 percent of developers working with open-source software have adopted the new GNU General Public License version 3" is obviously false, since the vast majority of GPL-licensed software have copyright notices that say that the software is available "under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version" - which includes GPL version 3.

What is this "Evans Data Corporation"? It would be interesting to see any other press releases they have written.

Re:Maybe I want my code to be used Commercially!

[Grishnakh]

The GPL isn't about preventing commercial use. If you bothered to read the license(s) you would know that.

It's about preserving users' freedoms. If a commercial entity uses GPL code and distributes that to end users (even paying ones), they're obligated to give them access to the source code. It's that simple. GPLv3 just adds some extra clauses to prevent companies from weaseling around the spirit of these simple terms by using any software patents or the like.

If you don't care about commercial entities taking your code, making changes, distributing it to users, and then refusing to give those users (which may include you) access to their modified code, then release your code under the BSD license, or into the public domain. It's your choice. Stop complaining about other peoples' choices.

Fud-mongering

[Vainglorious Coward]

Only 6% of developers...have adopted GPLv3...Two-thirds say they will not be adopting GPLv3 anytime in the next year, and 43% say they will never implement the new license

Interesting to compare this "shunning" with Vista :

less than 2% of UK-based firms have already upgraded all their desktops to Windows Vista. Just shy of 5% said that they have begun a Windows Vista desktop upgrade program. 6.5% said they will upgrade in the next 6 months; 12.6% in the next 12 months; 13% in the next 18 months; and 18% in the next two years

Summary : GPLv3 is more popular than Vista

Vista?

[athloi]

You mean the GPL3 is the Microsoft Vista of the open source licensing world?