Ask Slashdot: How Best To Deal With a GPLv2 License Infringement?

cultiv8 writes "I am a developer and released some code at one point under GPLv2. It's nothing huge — a small Drupal module that integrates a Drupal e-commerce system (i.e. Ubercart) with multiple Authorize.net accounts — but very useful for non-profits. Earlier today I discovered that a Drupal user was selling the module from their website for $49 and claiming it was their custom-made module. I'm no lawyer, but my perspective is this violates both the spirit and law of GPLv2, most specifically clause 2-b: 'You must cause any work that you distribute or publish, that in whole or in part contains or is derived from the Program or any part thereof, to be licensed as a whole at no charge to all third parties under the terms of this License.' Am I correct in my understanding of GPLv2? Do I have any recourse, and should I do anything about this? I don't care about money, I just don't want someone selling stuff that I released for free. How do most developers/organizations deal with licensing infringements of this type?"

Comments

ddos

[Anonymous Coward]

posting on slashdot is like a DDOS for their site.

Re:ddos

[davester666]

Kill them! We MUST KILL THEM!

Oh, wait. No, we do that for a GPLv3 infringement.

For GPLv2, we just send them a nasty email and egg their mother's house.

Drone strike

[Anonymous Coward]

You can buy a scale Predator drone for less than $1000 and a basic AI package for it for maybe half that. A few flybys and maybe a leaflet drop should be sufficient.

Re:Drone strike

[hairyfeet]

I'll tell you why certain weapons shouldn't be sold...morons. I have a friend that used to be a cop and i'll never forget one of his stories: They pull over this car driving slow and acting funny, when they search the car they find four gangbangers and an RPG in the back seat. Now when my friend said "WTF were you planning to do with an RPG boy?" do you know what they said? Driveby. That's right, they were gonna try to shoot a rocket out of a moving 4 door at a rival's house. Needless to say they were shocked when my friend told them that if they would have tried to fire that thing the backblast have blown them up real good.

So that is why you can't buy a hellfire, because some dipshit that has seen too many Rambo movies will get a hold of it and try to do a driveby on his ex with the damned thing. I mean can you imagine some methhead all paranoid with a pack of hydra missiles and a launcher?

But don't worry friend because if the government ever rolls the tanks i'm sure the national guard armories will be nicely emptied faster than you can say Arab Spring.

Re:Where is your license mentioned?

[InterestingFella]

Did the guy mention that he copyrighted his work? If he put it out there with nothing indicating that, there's an argument that he put it into the public domain, but if he copyrighted the project in a README file or in the core code files, he's covered. If someone is violating the GPL license and selling a modified version of his work, I'd recommend he contact the Electronic Frontier Foundation, who can help defend him, most likely free of charge.

Short answer: Selling GPLed software (even software you did not personally author) is okay.

Jesus... It's amazing what crap a first poster can say. No, you can not sell GPLed software you didn't write, though you may charge a distribution fee, and you must provide a way to access the source code you're distributing. If some a-hole is charging $50-ish bucks for your software, take him down.

You sir just won the award for Slashdot's 2011 Posts With Highest Percentage of Factually Incorrect Statements. Congratulations!