OpenSUSE's EULAs vs. Free Software Ideals

Anonymous Coward Maximus writes with some interesting (and disheartening) bits found in recent EULAs from SUSE: "Apparently the Beta came/comes with an interesting EULA discussed in this Planète Béranger article that just makes me think where is this whole Novell/Microsoft ridiculousness going to end? One quote from the EULA to whet your appetite: 'The Software may contain an automatic disabling mechanism that prevents its use after a certain period of time, so You should back up Your system and take other measures to prevent any loss of files or data.' Hmmm... Here is the full Beta 3 EULA for you to dissect. Note that the final release has a different EULA that doesn't look that scary, but still mentions things like 'You acquire only a license to use the Software' and such." Personally, I find the "Benchmark Testing" section (under GENERAL TERMS in the final release's EULA) to be pretty irksome.

Comments

Re:We'll see how it holds up vs. GPL

[Anonymous Coward]

I doubt we will.

SUSE would most likely have to sue. You don't need to sue for the right to use the software. If you have the right to and the ability to, you just use it. Adding extra unenforcible terms would be equivalent to me saying "you may not respond to this post". Would that stop you? If I genuinely thought I had the right to demand such a condition I could sue you if you did but it would be laughed out of court

Have you installed Firefox lately?

[Ed Avis]

If you took part in Firefox Download Day, did you notice the unpleasant EULA that the Firefox installer pops up? Pretty much the same as any proprietary application. Looks like another case of taking free software and slapping a restrictive EULA on it for no reason other than the legal department think it's a good idea. I don't think what OpenSUSE does is right, and I'm glad I use Fedora, but it is certainly becoming more common.