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Skype Gives Up Anti-GPL Appeal
l2718 writes "Yesterday we discussed Skype's appeal of a German court's ruling against them regarding a violation of the GPL. Harald Welte (the plaintiff) now reports in his blog that following oral argument, Skype decided to drop the appeal and accept the lower court ruling in Weite's favor. More details and analysis at Groklaw. Congratulations to Mr. Welte and GPL-violations.org!"
Is his name Welte or Weite?
This ist the first time, a foreign firm loses in a German court in a GPL-related case. Furthermore, the judge pointed out that it is not sufficient to offer the related sources only on the internet and mention this in a rather general way in the product manual.
:-)
Go Harald
Regards
Stirz
Also,
If a publisher wants to publish a book of an author that wants his book only to be published in a green envelope, then that might seem odd to you, but still you will have to do it as long as you want to publish the book and have no other agreement in place.It is freedom, in a way, that binds you with some responsibility. And how difficult it is for many people to understand.
One does have freedom to choose not to drive on roads. But when you choose to drive on roads, there is binding of following certain traffic rules, for the benefit of all. And one must understand the logic behind those bindings.
Go...Penguin ...Go...
hilarious
for not being a prick and pushing the thing around like sco did.
Read radical news here
OH NOES I'LL HAVE TO RESPECT THE DEVELOPERS WISHES, WHICH IS MOST CASES WON'T COST ME ANY MONEY AT ALL AND WILL MAKE DEVELOPING MUCH EASIER. If you really think this is so evil, there's nothing to stop you developing your own tools, and no-one ever said that the GPL was there to help people make money, it's there to protect people's freedom when it comes to software, if companies use it to make money that's just a bonus for them.
Shouldn't that be "don't fuck with the GNU"? I mean, I know people are hesitant to refer to the Free Software Foundation and use the term "open source" more often than "free software", but not referencing the GNU Project when talking about the GNU General Public License is pretty ridiculous. The penguin may have helped spread free software and all, but this isn't his fight.
It is freedom, in a way, that binds you with some responsibility. And how difficult it is for many people to understand.
People often want to have authority without responsibility: let me do what I want, without having to pay attention to other people's terms, short- and long-term impact, etc. But if you want freedom from this responsibility, you must also give up the authority that requires it. You can try to fight it, but this always comes back in the end.
$nice = $webHosting + $domainNames + $sslCerts
See how long you can get by without gcc. Even the iPhone relies on gcc.
Tell me about how all thos iPhone apps are infected.
Did the slap down go along the lines of, "Well, since you believed the license which permitted you to make these copies to be invalid, each copy you made was intended to be a violation of the copyrights for this code. We could therefore start the settlement process by negotiating how many thousands of euros you'll pay per copy."?
I think it really should go something like that. If you think a license in invalid, you're not allowed to use the code under that license. Therefore, you have no license under which to use the code. So if you use the code anyway, you're purposefully committing copyright violations, just the same as if the license is valid and you don't live up to its terms.
Either way, they violated copyright. It's a damn poor argument to make that you thought you'd just use some code because you didn't think there was a valid license that gave you a right to use it.
I can't believe they're getting nailed for providing a download link as the only distribution means.
If they wanted to be complete dicks about it, they could charge a $50 distribution fee and only offer a printed copy by snail mail. Wouldn't that be legit w/ the GPL?
Is there another issue?
I agree with you right up to the point where you say "You can try to fight it, but this always comes back in the end."
That is something I found out when I bought into a condo complex. Where I live the ruling council has enormous powers and very little legal responsibility. What little responsibility assigned to them by the relevant legislation is ignored at will because the only way to make them responsible is to take them to court. If there are N units in the complex they have (N-1)X funds to draw on to fight and hire lawyers while you have X funds to fight and hire lawyers. Usually the ruling council has taken out an insurance policy that protects them from consequences for their misdeeds and so the insurance company will usually provide them a lawyer, at no cost. So it is really you against (N-1) people and an insurance company. If you lose you bear all the costs, if they lose the insurance company picks it up or they split it (N-1) ways. You can win but it's almost always going to be a pyrrhic victory. This is all obvious and serves to promote abuse.
Seriously, if you want to see mean spirited, petty, power mongering, dishonest behavior, where it doesn't all come back on them in the end, then you don't need to go to a third world country or see a war in some far off land... just buy a condo.
The tyrant will always find a pretext for his tyranny - Aesop
You know what? I was going to try to tell you how wrong you were, and how you basically don't have any idea what you are talking about (or you do, so you know how to make sure everything you say is wrong).
But you know what? That's stupid. I'm not going to argue. You're right. You're absolutely right, the GPL will corrupt your code, your people, and your family. You will have to open source your bedroom activities, and invite RMS to watch. It's all true.
Because, frankly, I'm sick of companies who are too dumb to figure it out themselves, or too fucking retarded to hire the cheapest lawyer they can find to explain it to them if they can't figure it out for themselves, what exactly the GPL does and doesn't do. Cus if you can't figure it out, and are going to just assume whatever comes into your crack-damage brain (it'll pollute us all! no wait it's free we can do whatever we want!)... Then I don't want you using GPL code.
I mean seriously. If you can't figure out how maybe modifying the Linux kernel into your product means you have some obligations to follow vis-a-vis this free OS kernel you just picked up, and how this doesn't affect all the code you wrote that has nothing to do with the kernel... Then you are an idiot, your company deserves to fail, and I can only hope that your fear of using GPL software puts you at a competitive disadvantage and thus hastens that day.
So yes. GPL is viral. Pass it on.
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