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GPL Violations By D-Link and Boxee
An anonymous reader submitted a link to a bit of a rant on GPL issues connected to D-Link and Boxee. They spend quite a bit of time explaining "Tivoization is a dangerous attempt to curtail users' freedom: the right to modify your software will become meaningless if none of your computers let you do it. GPLv3 stops tivoization by requiring the distributor to provide you with whatever information or data is necessary to install modified software on the device."
GPL is based on copyright, dictating the rules by which the work can be transferred (or sold, or given). It's the same as breaking the Microsoft EULA when you pirate your Windows copy.
Surely, there may be not enough GPL authors going after people breaking their licenses, but it falls on the same category [I *think* the FSF sometimes offers legal help for those trying to sue companies to enforce their GPL-licensed products.]
some of the complaints are that promised features were never implemented. learned this a long time ago. buy on the feature set at the time of sale, don't ever trust a company to implement new promised features. after the sale they are thinking about selling the next version, not paying developers to code software you already paid for
RTFA:
The Truth
Your Boxee Box was shipped containing GPLv3 software. You should be able to install modified versions of software to your Boxee Box.
Grammer Nazis - I mod you "troll" unless you actually add something on-topic. Yes, I know I have mispellings in my sig.
First: there is no issue with GPL and tivoization. GPLv2 allows it and GPLv3 forbids it, full stop. It is as clear as day and every developer can make an informed choice as to what he/she wants to allow with the code.
Now it seems that these things include GPG that is under GPLv3. So it looks an awful lot as a violation, if confirmed. At the same time it seems that the program was removed by online firmware updates, so everything would be kosher for the GPLv3 (that gives the option to stop distributing the offending code and be legally safe)
Did someone at Boxee actually edit a forum post to change the author's intent?
Forum Post Screenshots
Is Boxee's operation really this shady?
By whom? Maybe the EFF.
I think part of the problem is that, to the best of my knowledge, the GPL hasn't been fully tested in court, and there is no single body (and certainly not with a lot of resources) who can police this. I'm not even sure the EFF has standing to sue everybody who might do this ... unless the GPL says they're the effective copyright holders for everything GPL'd, short of an amicus curiae the EFF doesn't own the code which is alleged to have been violated.
A lot of companies seem to more or less say "too bad" when it comes to the provisions and providing this stuff ... they're just not willing to provide you with the details you'd need, admit that they're using the GPL'd software, or provide you with the sources even if they are. So, effectively they rip it off with impunity and laugh at you.
If there's no actual consequence for these companies, what is going to change? This is far from the first time we've heard about companies flipping the bird at the terms of the GPL.
And, really, based on my experience with my latest D-Link router ... it might be time to consider a change anyway. My latest router has a tendency to lose connection on one of its ports, and has some issues which may or may not be the fault of Vista.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Basically GPL is a violation of my rights to publ,ish source code and make money off of it. No one has the right to force me to release my developed code for free.
You're under no obligation to release your code under the GPL. You can release it under any licence you want. If you choose not to abide by the GPL, you cannot base your software on GPLed code. Go and write your own software from scratch, and don't steal mine.
It's the same as breaking the Microsoft EULA when you pirate your Windows copy.
No. An EULA takes away rights on something you bought, the GPL gives you rights on something you've copied for free (or bought for money, but GPL gives you the right to copy it for free after that).
Easy, do not link to GPL code. You ask for your rights but do not want to respect the rights of the GPL code authors?, When you link to GPL code, nobody is forcing you to release your code, your decision to link and use GPL and distribute it is what force you to do that, do not want to do it? do not take the decision to use GPL code in your software
Not true ... it prevents you from taking code you got under the GPL, modifying it, and releasing it as closed source. You are free to write your own code from scratch. You just can't write derivative works and not play by their terms.
Things like LGPL allow you to use the library to connect to, and the stuff you write is completely your own and you can do anything you like with it.
Yes, that's true. If you want to have your code not be "tainted" by the implied socialism of a license which forces you to share, then don't start with GPL'd code as a base.
You're arguing that you should be able to take the GPL code, modify it, and then change the terms of the license so you don't have to play by the rules. If you want to do that, something like a BSD or an Apache license might be more suited for you. But, just because you want to take GPL stuff and make it not GPL, doesn't mean you have any right to use the code in a way that violates their license.
You are completely free to write something from scratch and not look at anything GPL'd at all. If you don't have the time and energy (or the skillset) to write your own version ... well, nobody is required to provide it to you. You're whining about the GPL being socialist while at the same time acting like it's someone else's responsibility to write the software you base your own off ... which is socialism, but geared to your benefit.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Yea, notice step 1: Reset your box to factory default. The only GPLv3 piece of software on the box is GPG, and it was removed in a firmware update, so the case here is extremely weak.
GPL is really another word for socialist run software development.
Actually, 'socialist software development' would be where you let someone else develop the software, then steal it and put your name on it.
GPLv2 didn't "Allow" what Tivo did, it overlooked it. Once Tivo Inc. showed GNU just how evil a corporation can be, they had to spend time and money creating GPLv3, time and money that could have been spent actually doing something, instead had to be spent on lawyering.
As a side note, Tivo Inc. is losing customers, and every useless Tivo sitting unsold at a yard sale is a message to consumers that a Tivo box is worthless. If Tivo Inc. were to provide some small amount of functionality for these machine, they would at least be able to upsell some customers.
All ideas^H^H^H^H^Hprocesses in this post are Patent Pending. (as well as the process of patenting all postings)
This is why the FSF asks for copyright assignment in GNU projects. They become party to the license, and can act on its infringement.
Doing the Right Thing should not be preempted by making a buck.
Maybe you should look at licenses that don't place any restriction on what people do with your code.
Then, once you've got a really great project, I'll take it, place it under my own licence that forbids you from even mentioning it again, and call it my own. Since I can afford scarier lawyers than you, there's nothing you can do about it.
How does that sound?
Tell me, in a free society are you able to do anything you want, or are you able to do what you want as long as it does not infringe on the rights of others? The GPL is free as in Freedom..You can take someone's code, and modify it however you like, you can use it however you see fit, but you still must not infringe on the rights of the author. It is the right of the author to put restrictions, just like it is the right of a free society to make laws that make sure you live within the rules of that free society.
When you cant win, ad hominem.
Quick Google Search:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_General_Public_License#The_GPL_in_court
http://techrights.org/2007/11/23/gpl-court-test/
"Science can amuse and fascinate us all, but it is engineering that changes the world. " - Asimov.
Well, yes ... that's hard to dispute, and it more or less comes down to some philosophical stuff which not everyone always agrees with.
I guess it depends on "which" version of "free" you mean ... free as in beer, free as in free, free as in Libre, and who knows what else.
BSD is free and unencumbered, and it has its place.
GPL is free almost in the sense that the software itself is "liberated" and has its own rights, intended to ensure that the software remains equally free for anybody who might ever want it, and that you can't take away the rights of the software to remain free -- I like to think of the GPL'd software as almost emancipated and with a stake in things.
Some software is free as in free, but you have no rights to do anything with it or make derivative works.
The GPL is more like a "bill of rights", both for the software and anybody who might like to use it, and is intended to benefit pretty much everybody, in perpetuity, and part of the way it achieves that is to limit the extent to which you can take it and stop adhering to that ideology. Since it uses copyright as its foundation, it necessarily has to retain restrictions to you ... you only have rights to make copies of this work if you adhere to the terms. BSD is more along the lines of "have this for free and do anything you like", no restrictions or limitations, no obligations ... just code to do with as you please.
Unfortunately, the two camps often have very opposite points of view in terms of which is "better" or "more free" -- I've used both fairly extensively, and they each have their place. It's really hard to come down on one side or another without it more or less devolving into screeching monkeys, which is what usually happens when this comes up on Slashdot. :-P
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
That is what he means. He wants to take GPL software, and use it in his work and not share-alike.
Almost no software, and certainly no major projects. Except, of the top of my head: GCC, GPG and Samba
...If it was "hackable". But it seems that hardware makers today want more than selling you their product. They want to make sure you don't use it unless it's in a way they approve of.
For now, I have alternatives (buy something else), but I am afraid my daughter will not have that option.
moi
Basically GPL is a violation of my rights to publ,ish source code and make money off of it.
If you want to make money off of what you publish, you are free to do so. One specific business model is verboten -namely, closing the code- but that is only one business model among many. A number of companies are doing quite fine making money off of open-source code, and they do so in a number of different ways. The only thing stopping you from doing this same thing is that you don't want to. That's your prerogative, of course, but you have no grounds to complain that you are being prevented from making money.
No one has the right to force me to release my developed code for free.
By default, no. The GPL is an agreement, not a law. You yourself give the authors of GPL software the right to force you to open your code when you agreed to use their software: those are the terms of the agreement. If you don't want to agree, that's fine: just don't use GPL'd code, and you're golden.
It is a companies right to protect their IP...
Completely correct. This is why you should not violate the IP rights of the author of GPL'd source code by closing it. If you don't like those terms, fine; don't use GPL'd source code.
...and GPL prevents that.
Completely false. In fact, in order to make it work for you, you're going to have to protect your IP. You will, however, not be allowed to tread on the IP rights of the authors of the code you are selling: not your own, and not anyone else's. If you are uncomfortable with this, all you have to do is not use GPL'd code.
All free softare if truly free should be GPL.
Um... did you miss some words in your sentence here? It doesn't make sense in the context of the rest of your post.
The GPL is not free in the same way that I'm not "free" to murder you.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
You cannot say that I can use it however I see fit, but then say it also has restrictions. The two are incompatible. BSD is truly use as I see fit and fits the free as in freedom motto much better than GPL.
Tesla was a genius. Edison however was a overrated hack who liked to torture puppies.
That's not the point. If you had gpgv2 on windows you could update it, Windows won't prevent you from doing that.
If you have gpgv2 on this boxee thingy you can't update it - the tivoisation prevents that.
That is a gplv3 violation, so they have no right to distribute gpgv2.
This may or may not apply to other software on the boxee.
Watch this Heartland Institute video
I fail to see how that has any relevance. Tivo did something free software people didn't like, and they named that thing "Tivoization" because Tivo was the first/highest profile (not sure which) culprit.
Here's the basic issue. gpgv2 is GPL3. It's in the box. The user cannot modify it, as per the GPL3 license. Thus, Boxee is failing to meet the GPL3 license obligations.
It doesn't matter if the main code is proprietary. It doesn't matter if the kernel is GPL2. What matters in the court of law is that this particular piece does not live up to the license obligations that the author placed on the code as a condition of copying. If the authors of gpgv2 sued, Boxee would lose, assuming the GPL stands up in court (which I expect it would).
Nobody said you can use it as you see fit.
GPL says you can use it as you see fit providing you give the same freedom to anyone you distribute the software (the original, or your modification of the original) to.
If you find this a great burden then don't use the GPL software and stop whining.
Watch this Heartland Institute video
See you in five years once you have a working implementation!--all harshness aside, you're free to have no connection to foss.
Consigning somebody to a sort of 'siberia' because they don't follow the party line seems a bit... well, stalinist.
I was going to misspell it 'stallmanist' but decided not to.
My consulting firm helps law firms and their customers come into compliance with the GPL and other Free Software licenses - both before and after they distribute the product. I can tell you they do take it seriously when they run into trouble, because there is not just the threat of a lawsuit, but the threat of having infringing products prohibited from being imported into the nations where they wish to sell them.
What a lot of companies are having problems with is establishing a compliance program before they get that letter from the Software Freedom Conservancy (which has sued about 40 companies, no kidding). Too many of them fix the problem after it's happened.
Tivo-ization is not one of the things the companies are in trouble for, because the software in question is under GPL2, not GPL3. The problems are from simple non-compliance with the license terms.
Bruce Perens.
Actually, that's more like outright theft or Stalinism -- we're taking it from whether you like it or not.
The GPL is socialist more like the way a co-op works ... participation is voluntary, and is intended to benefit everybody. If you don't want to participate in the co-op, you are free to go elsewhere.
Since you still retain the freedom to not use the GPL'd software in any way, shape, or form ... you're free to opt out of the "socialism" part. That doesn't mean you should be able to derive the benefit without playing by the same rules. As a matter of fact, you're explicitly prohibited from that.
Essentially, the GPL is a "social contact" where everybody agrees to play by the same set of rules, meant to provide a level of benefit to everybody. You're all in, or you're all out. But, if you're not helping everyone else out according to the rules, you have no right to expect a share in their labors.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
NO!! We are violating your liberty to steal my work and violate my rights as the author.
-- Carlie Coats
author/distributor of >380,000 lines of GPL/LGPL environmental modeling code
"My opinions are my own, and I've got *lots* of them!"
Maybe you should look at licenses that don't place any restriction on what people do with your code.
Then, once you've got a really great project, I'll take it, place it under my own licence that forbids you from even mentioning it again, and call it my own.
With many licenses, you could redistribute the software with a new license, but you're making it sound like you could change the license of the original (which you can't). You can place your copy under whatever restrictive license you want, but it doesn't change the fact that the original is still free (and the original author probably owns the copyright).
Since I can afford scarier lawyers than you, there's nothing you can do about it.
Having scarier lawyers has nothing to do with it. BSD-style intentionally let other people re-license the code, because some people want their code to be usable by anyone, even if it means less ideological purity.
Then why aren't the terms provided at the time of purchase?
Last time I bought software at a retail store, nobody asked me if I agreed to any terms before I paid for it.
Let me guess... some judge somewhere says that the purchase is not complete until I proceed to install the software, and it asks me to agree to the EULA. If I don't agree, I'm free to return the software or not use it. Even if the retailer won't allow the return (the box is open) and the manufacturer directs me to the retailer.
If you can't tell, I have little respect for EULAs.
> there is an actionable claim here for a license violation.
Sounds like the license violation has already been cured - if they have stopped distributing the software and removed from existing installations best they can with updates.
If they haven't acutally stopped distributing, then the copyright holder could sue them to get them to either a) come into compliance or b) stop distributing. Looks like we know what they will do, since they've already gone down that route.
Question is, is it worth suing them to get them to really remove the software (if is still really there) that they already removed from users (unless you jump through some hoops) ?
DLink has a history of GPL violation in the past. I am frankly not one bit surprised...
ELOI, ELOI, LAMA SABACHTHANI!?
As I don't support anything related to GPLv3 I just don't care. Its a flawed political license that has no place with open source or free software. I hope that it is tested in court a few more times and found to be invalid so it can just go away.