Red Hat Makes a GPL-Compatible Patent Deal

Bruce Perens writes "Red Hat has settled patent suits with Firestar Software, Inc., Amphion, and Datatern on a patent covering the Object-Relational Database Model, which those companies asserted was used in the jBoss Hibernate package — not in Red Hat Linux. The settlement is said to protect upstream developers and derivative works of the upstream software, thus protecting the overall Open Source community. Full terms of the settlement and patent licenses are not available at this time." Reader Koohoolinn adds a link to RedHat's own report of the settlement and adds that the deal "is GPLv2 and even GPLv3-compatible." Koohoolinn also points out commentary on Groklaw that this deal "means that those who claim the GPL isolates itself from standards bodies' IP pledges are wrong. It is possible to come up with language that satisfies the GPL and still acknowledges patents, and this is the proof. That means Microsoft could do it for OOXML if it wanted to. So who is isolating whom?"

Comments

Good for them

[chunk08]

Red Hat is the best thing for the open source community in terms of patents.

Re:Good for them

[cp.tar]

Red Hat is the best thing for the open source community in terms of patents.

If I understand this rightly, this is a veritable gift to the Open Source community. Kudos.

Thank you RedHat

[pembo13]

Not sure why there is even a patent on this, but making a deal which protects everyone is pretty nice.

Not hard

[BlueParrot]

License the patent to all software that is licensed under GPLv2 or latter, problem solved. The GPLv3 doesn't actually ban you from patenting anything, it just says that if you implement those patents in a GPLv3 covered work, you must grant downstream developers the right to implement those patents in their modified versions of the software. Similarly the paragraph which demands you do not sign certain types of patent deals only applies to deals which gives protection to only a subset of the receivers of derivative works. Nothing stops you from making such a deal which provides a license to anybody who uses a GPL compatible license for works that implement it.

Re:Not hard

[BlueParrot]

And gosh, some clever truck manufacturer will find a way to claim the design out of a GPLed car to fit into his truck,

Yes, that is the idea, IT IS PRECISELY THE IDEA. The GPL is not intended to let you limit your software patents to only some subset of all GPL software. It is intended to keep GPL software, any GPL software, safe from patent threats. Thus if the truck manufacturer licenses his trucks under the GPL, he will be allowed to use the patent that covered the car. This is not a flaw, IT IS WORKING AS INTENDED. To be safe from the patent he will have to put the truck under the GPL, which means he will be forced to give the operating manual and blueprints of the truck to anybody who buys it from him. Thus either he will be blocked from implementing the patent, or the community gains information about how to build trucks. This is only a problem if your goal was to use some GPL code that implements your patent (i.e the cars ) while simultaneously threatening OTHER GPL products which implement your patents (i.e the trucks). The GPL seeks to prevent you from doing this. Thus while you have given a very good example of how the GPL achieves this, you incorrectly described it as a problem when it is in fact the very point of the GPL.

Legitimacy?

[XanC]

Does a deal like this lend legitimacy to a ridiculous patent, thus encouraging more patent trolling? Would ignoring them have been better? Maybe this patent is actually meaningful, but I doubt it.

NeXT EOF?

[chochos]

I guess Apple could have just jumped in and showed prior art with the Enterprise Objects Framework they got from NeXT; it's the oldest ORM I've seen (and used). Version 1.0 came out in 1994. They ported it to Java when they ported WebObjects in 2001. Cayenne is an open source implementation very similar to the original. Surely Apple has some patents on those stuff, or they could have just showed prior art, I mean, how old are the patents from these companies that RedHat paid off?

Re:NeXT EOF?

[Miseph]

Didn't you get the memo, Apple are so nice and fair that they would always happily lend a hand to other large corporations with or without any kind of motive or incentive. They'd also never engage in vendor lock in, or support DRM to keep software from being used in unapproved ways or on unapproved hardware.

This is just common knowledge.

Re:Sure this protects anyone other than Red Hat, I

[mhall119]

In other words the settlement details are rarely every made public in these kinds of situations. What they have announced is that the settlement grants a royalty-free patent license to all upstream and downstream developers, distributors and users.

Re:Sure this protects anyone other than Red Hat, I

[eparis]

Obviously I am not a lawyer but the way I read it many people other than Red Hat are protected, but not quite all. If you develop your own project completely from scratch and you are violating this patent (which may or may not be dubious, RH never admitted to violating it or that it was legit) you are on your own. The licence of your wholely new and unrelated project is irrelevant. If you go and get your project accepted into Fedora (pretty easy task) you are then covered since Fedora is a RH brand. Now your upstream code from the Fedora project (and any predecessor code created before you got accepted into Fedora) is now covered by this licence so other distros or projects can take your work use, modify, and distribute it just like any GPL code and are legal. It seems from my reading of all the press over the last 2 days and the RH FAQs like the only condition that needs to be met is that code which makes use of this 'patent' exist in a Red Hat brand. If it exists, existed, or will exist, in Fedora everybody is covered. This is a great thing for RH to do to support all of us who use a RH supported distro or some other distro.

upstream developers are covered ..

[rs232]

"Are you sure this protects anyone other than Red Hat, Inc.?"

"Upstream developers receive a perpetual, fully paid-up, royalty-free, irrevocable worldwide license to the patents in suit"

"All products distributed under a Red Hat brand are covered .. In addition, derivative works .. are protected"

Re:This is SO EXCITING !!

[lahvak]

Is the son going to be GPL'd? In other words, can I reuse half of his genetic information to produce my own version? Will you provide an access to the source?

Re:Good for Linux, bad for OSS

[setagllib]

At least the GPLv3 protects you in this case. If I remember correctly, by distributing to you a GPLv3 implementation of their patent, a company explicitly protects you from suits based on that patent. GPLv3 has guys like you in mind. That's why it's an even more aggressive little-guy protector than GPLv2.

Gift?

[Bruce Perens]

This would be a gift if Red Hat didn't get value from that community. But since they do, I think the best way to describe it is that Red Hat is sharing the way the community would like more companies to share.

Re:Gift?

[Bruce Perens]

Since the GPL was considered to be incompatible with patents, I'd say this was more than simple sharing.

That was FUD, though. The GPL wants some of your patent rights, just enough to protect GPL software from patents. You still have lots of room to license them commercially.

We can certainly call this an achievement. But really, this sort of legal innovation is what any company that wants to be a sincere partner in the Open Source community to the extent Red Hat is would be expected to do. We're not upset with Novell because they "didn't give us a gift". We're upset with them because they didn't do what is expected of anyone in their position. Red Hat just made that especially clear.

Re:This is SO EXCITING !!

[Bruce Perens]

Dear Son,

It's time you paid the royalties you owe on my DNA. After all, you're running half of it in each and every one of your cells, clearly an unlicensed derivative work. And don't you dare "make it available" without a license!

Dad

:-)

Re:This is SO EXCITING !!

[gstoddart]

Dear Son,
It's time you paid the royalties you owe on my DNA. After all, you're running half of it in each and every one of your cells, clearly an unlicensed derivative work. And don't you dare "make it available" without a license!

Dad :-)

Dear Dad,

As your 'property' was provided freely in collaboration with Mom with no stipulated conditions at time of release, my DNA can be considered to be the results of a legitimate collaborative effort and a voluntary submission. Therefore, it is presumptive that a co-licensing agreement was implicit at time of production.

While I will refrain from directly competing with you in this market place, I do reserve the right to produce a limited amount of derivative works, and long as I do not use it for commercial purposes.

Also, I will be making it available for limited distribution for experimental purposes to the first girl willing to have it. However, I will make efforts to ensure that no further copies are created.

Son.