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Software Freedom Conservancy: Distributing Linux With ZFS Is Illegal (phoronix.com)
LichtSpektren writes: Phoronix reports that Bradley M. Kuhn and Karen M. Sandler at the Software Freedom Conservancy (SFS) have posted a blog post today arguing that Canonical's plan to distribute Ubuntu 16.04 LTS "Xenial Xerus" with support for the ZFS file system violates the Linux kernel's GPLv2 license.
On February 18, Dustin Kirkland at Canonical wrote on his blog: "We at Canonical have conducted a legal review, including discussion with the industry's leading software freedom legal counsel, of the licenses that apply to the Linux kernel and to ZFS. And in doing so, we have concluded that we are acting within the rights granted and in compliance with their terms of both of those licenses...The CDDL cannot apply to the Linux kernel because zfs.ko is a self-contained file system module — the kernel itself is quite obviously not a derivative work of this new file system. And zfs.ko, as a self-contained file system module, is clearly not a derivative work of the Linux kernel but rather quite obviously a derivative work of OpenZFS and OpenSolaris. Equivalent exceptions have existed for many years, for various other stand alone, self-contained, non-GPL kernel modules. Our conclusion is good for Ubuntu users, good for Linux, and good for all of free and open source software."
The SFS's blog post of today states: "We are sympathetic to Canonical's frustration in this desire to easily support more features for their users. However, as set out below, we have concluded that their distribution of zfs.ko violates the GPL."
On February 18, Dustin Kirkland at Canonical wrote on his blog: "We at Canonical have conducted a legal review, including discussion with the industry's leading software freedom legal counsel, of the licenses that apply to the Linux kernel and to ZFS. And in doing so, we have concluded that we are acting within the rights granted and in compliance with their terms of both of those licenses...The CDDL cannot apply to the Linux kernel because zfs.ko is a self-contained file system module — the kernel itself is quite obviously not a derivative work of this new file system. And zfs.ko, as a self-contained file system module, is clearly not a derivative work of the Linux kernel but rather quite obviously a derivative work of OpenZFS and OpenSolaris. Equivalent exceptions have existed for many years, for various other stand alone, self-contained, non-GPL kernel modules. Our conclusion is good for Ubuntu users, good for Linux, and good for all of free and open source software."
The SFS's blog post of today states: "We are sympathetic to Canonical's frustration in this desire to easily support more features for their users. However, as set out below, we have concluded that their distribution of zfs.ko violates the GPL."
I'm not sure what anyone would stand to gain by arguing that Ubuntu is violating the GPLv2 license. It seems kind of ridiculous.
I happen to like using ZFS.
But fine, distributing drivers with binary blobs is OK, while this little license incompatibility between two open-source projects is a big deal. Whatever, dudes.
Why oh why do we have to keep shooting ourselves in the foot?
OK I'm a BSD user so, well, stones and glass houses, but even so the open source community's continuing ability to why things should not be allowed is depressing...most people in our crowd want our stuff to be USED by as many people as possible...
Shirley, SFC for Software Freedom Conservancy?
I've got a fever and the only prescription is more COBOL.
One wonders if SFC sees a risk to the community from Oracle acting against Canonical. If not, they may inadvertently be playing dog-in-the-manger.
davecb@spamcop.net
Linux does not have a stable file-system and volume manager that can come anywhere near the performance and stability of ZFS.
Get your PostgreSQL here: http://www.commandprompt.com/
The Linux Foundation, as the copyright holder of the Linux kernel, gets to determine what is and is not allowed.
This is matter does not involve Software Freedom Conservancy (SFS) or Free Software Foundation (FSF), they are are not even parties to the copyright license used for the Linux kernel.
In my professional opinion, Canonical can feel free to tell SFS to go pound sand.
There's no such thing as unlimited freedom. You have to pick the freedoms you care about, and then forbid those that would violate it.
You're free to be free as long as your freedom matches what you've been told you're allowed to do to be free.
Some software freedom limits what you can do. Other software freedom doesn't give a crap.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
You can do whatever you want to do with your own software. Its when you distribute that software and hand it out you must abide by the copyrights.
Regardless of the legal situation, the holder of the copyright to the vast majority of the kernel doesn't object to binary modules. There are those who would argue that even certain user-space binaries are a GPL violation. Fortunately those voices haven't prevailed. I guess, at some point, to squelch any doubts, ZFS will have to get turned into something akin to a hybrid driver where code to load interchangeable binary blobs with a certain interface is contributed to the kernel under GPL and the blobs come with their own license. In this case it will be CDDLv1. This is somewhat of a PITA but it's actually good in the medium-term because it means that users face less ambiguity in terms of knowing under which license they are receiving code.
Software freedom means that you can't create derivative works and then distribute them with a license that restricts other people's freedom. It's the same reason that my freedom to swing my fist ends at your nose. You can do anything you want with the software and combine it with proprietary software even. You just can't *distribute* the changes.
>The FSF, stewards of the GPL, have stated many times over the past decades that they believe there is no legal distinction between dynamic and static linking of a C program and we agree.
The FSF is almost certainly wrong in this. Linking isn't going to even be considered in a court room. What they *will* consider is whether or not zfs.ko contains derivative work from Linux. Headers are now subject to copyright (as is my understanding) so it's very possible that it does. However, if they use "api-only" headers, such as posix stuff and it does not rely on being compiled against the GPL-ed version of the headers, then they are most likely going to be free and clear of any issues.
Personally, the SFC can go eat a bag of dicks and die in a fire.
Reading their piece, they sound like they are lawyers looking for a client, like they want to take Canonical to court over this. One likes to think that anyone who defends OSS must be on the side of the light, but I note that the Conservancy sued companies using Busybox over the objections of at least some of the copyright holders. This quote is kind of interesting:
"But that didn't stop them from creating a self-funding legal machine where they never found any actual useful code that should have gone upstream, but they still demanded $15k or so in legal fees each time so they could go sue the next company."
For those who didn't RTFA, the core of the question is this: Is a Linux distro that contains a ZFS module a combined product, derived from Linux and/or ZFS? Or are they two independent items that happen to be delivered in the same package. The Conservancy states "we have yet to encounter a Linux module that — when distributed in binary form — did not, in our view, yield combined work with Linux", and then they go on to say that the intend to "exhaust every diplomatic option...before seeking resolution from the courts".
Only: nobody is asking them to take anyone to court. If Oracle doesn't like this (they are the primary holder of ZFS copyrights), I'm sure they have their own lawyers. So WTF is going on here? Instead of a patent troll, maybe we have a GPL troll?
Enjoy life! This is not a dress rehearsal.
Oracle has been looking to profit form the free labor from open source software advocates ever since it was losing clients to MySQL which they later purchased. The original developers were so concerned they created MariaDB. And from this LibreOffice sprung to protect "OpenOffice" and after realizing Oracle was never going to make money on OO They give it to the Apache Foundation. Oracle has not had a history of playing nice with the open source community and their development on MySQL and related products has not exactly been dedicated. Suspect they are only doing it because it was a condition for the EU to allow the European portion of the take over of Sun Microsystems. Why hasn't Oracle just put put ZFS as a fully open GPL2 compliant code for all to use and improve? Probably, like OpenOffice, to see if they can exploit it to their benefit in some way, which could even sabotage Linux (or at least Ubuntu). Debian has the right idea in distributing the source only of ZFS. We'll see where this goes but I think The Software Freedom Conservancy is in the right, and in cases like this far better to err on the side of caution. If everyone lobbied Oracle, we could get a proper and compatible ZFS license that oracle couldn't do a poison pill or "about face" on later. Why not give that a try.
"Imagination is more important than knowledge" - Einstein
It's the same reason that my freedom to swing my fist ends at your nose.
Even if you only swung close to my nose, I could probably still have to arrested for assault.
Using Linux?! even after systemd? why? :)
oh... nevermind... FreeBSD is going to switch to using NOSH (systemd for BSD)... using Linux makes sense then.
I answered my own question
Which reminds me: here's something from "Life of Brian" that stuck in my mind when I saw it the other day:
[the members of "The People's Front of Judea" are sitting in the amphitheatre; Stan has just announced that he wants to be a woman and wants to be called "Loretta," and is explaining why]
Stan: I want to have babies. ... you can't HAVE babies!
Reg: You want to have babies?!?!
Stan: It's every man's right to have babies if he wants them.
Reg: But
Stan: Don't you oppress me!
Reg: I'm not oppressing you, Stan. You haven't got a womb! Where's the foetus gonna gestate? You gonna keep it in a box?
So, I don't want to use proprietary software, I just want the right to use proprietary software, even if I can't use proprietary software. Waitaminute...I actually do that all the time. So it looks like the "Reg" in my own story hasn't actually succeeded in oppressing me...
So, Software Freedom means that you can't do what you want with your software? Is this one of those Richard Stalin - I mean, Stallman - groups or something?
If you didn't write it, it's not your software. You can acquire the right to use it in exchange for your agreement to the terms of the license. The freedom part comes in where the terms of the license say that you get to modify and distribute it without anyone's permission. Again, in exchange for your agreement to the terms of the license.
Nope, no sig
License violations are not illegal. The word illegal does not appear anywhere in the story. What the fuck is it that you do here, other than fuck up stories?
This is the kind of bullshit that has kept me away from any kind of involvement in open source/free software etc.
This kind if pointless shithead quibbling.
Sermon on the mount
If user compiles the shim layer, they're violating the copyright. This is no different from Nvidia and ATI/AMD binary blobs.
I've read both arguments, and since I know everyone posting here has also (right?), I won't bother with too much of a critique.
I have to side with Canonical on this one. Their short and sweet post pretty much puts to bed the legal ramblings of the Software Freedom Conservancy. The SFS article reads like they started out trying to make a point, then has to fallback on an academic lesson on GPL Incompatibility and Combined/Derivative works. I would go so far as to say their verbosity defeats their own argument, while managing to inset the letters "ZFS" wherever they can find room.
Past that, as someone who uses ZFS on FreeBSD, ZFS is pretty fucking useful. Canonical's legal inclusion of ZFS as self-contained file system module is a big step forward for Linux.
Brought to you by Carl's Junior.
Maybe they should remove the word "Freedom" from their organization. Look up what freedom means in the dictionary, please. Open Source developers want unrestricted use of software for everyone, "FREEDOM", well put it in the public domain and be done with it. BSD, GPL, MIT, Apache, etc... are all copyright and place restrictions on what you can and cannot do so it's not "FREEDOM". So stop associating "FREEDOM" with restrictions.
More accurate would be: "could give rise to a civil cause of action." We usually say that something is "illegal" when it violates criminal law, or some other statue passed by the legislature for a public purpose. Violating contract or license terms is not illegal in this sense. Any legal risk comes from the willingness of the aggrieved party to pursue a remedy. Crucially, there is no public stake in enforcing these rights: if the rightsholder does not want to pursue a remedy, nobody else will care. This is in contrast to activities which are prohibited by statue: the public at large has an interest in prohibiting these activities because they are bad for everyone for one reason or another. It's true that this claim could be based in copyright, which is a "creature of statue" so to speak, but copyright itself is designed to be enforced only by private parties. And more importantly, in this case the text of the license would be the determinative factor.
Anyhow, it's just a semantic niggle, but it really annoys me when people write deliberately misleading headlines like "flashing your firmware is now illegal," when they are really just talking about private causes of action based on licenses or private contracts. In fact, the word "illegal" does not appear at all in TFA.
So you don't have freedom of speech? (Don't bring up the canard about "yelling fire in crowded movie theater.")
Canard because first it's "falsely" yelling fire in crowded movie theater. And second there is a difference between political speech and slander. Freedom of speech never included that you can slander anyone you want and be free from consequences. There isn't an internal contradiction in the previous statement because one must qualify what speech means.
Now If what you mean by "unlimited freedom" is that "freedom" means whatever pops into someone head then you're correct. Freedom of Religion means, in essence, freedom of conscience; that you can have quiet enjoyment of your beliefs. Quiet enjoyment does not include freedom to kill disbelievers for "insulting" the religion.
If you're scared of your govt then you need to further restrict its powers
Vote 3rd Party in 2016 and beyond
Insanity like this one makes the free x opensource software fight...
TFI says: "The FSF, stewards of the GPL, have stated many times over the past decades that they believe there is no legal distinction between dynamic and static linking of a C program and we agree. Accordingly, the analysis is quite obvious to us: if ZFS were statically linked with Linux and shipped as a single work, few would argue it was not a “work based on the Program” under GPLv2." And that's where it all falls apart. How do we know that it's not a "mere aggregation". See http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gp... which argues that determining whether a separate module is a covered work is actually a tricky question requiring some thought and analysis.
I run Windows... I just pay the mindless overlord in Redmond to keep my life happy.
The summary dedicated 3x more space to a previous Canonical blog, than to the actual article being discussed in the Headline. Way to go!
*** Suerte a todos y Feliz dia!
ZFS can be replaced by btrfs in many cases. Yes ZFS is more mature and has more of a track record. But only by people using btrfs will it gain that level of testing in production environments. It is quite stable now and OK some may have data that they just can't bring themselves to trust away from XFS or ext4 or ZFS but I think it's time to look at alternatives to ZFS.
Yeah I'm not paying that fucking idiot any attention and neither should anyone else.
So you don't have freedom of speech?
I didn't say that. I didn't even mention speech. I said freedoms are limited, and the freedom of speech is no exception. There are limits to the things you can say.
Who is making changes to anything?
I'm starting to think GNU is the problem with "GNU/Linux" these days.
You can have freedom of speech, but that is mutually exclusive with the freedom to silence people. By granting freedom of speech, you are implicitly removing the freedom to silence people, and vice versa.
Copyright holders who license under a free software license gain compliance and social respect for choosing a license that lets us run, share, and modify covered software. There is nothing to gain in saying popular GNU/Linux distributions don't have to comply with licenses but other distributors do. There is also a lot to gain by showing that licensing under a popular free software license (such as the GNU GPL) is enforcible. One such benefit: Every enforcement action taken showing how enforcible the GPL is helps silence critics who claim otherwise.
Digital Citizen
Basically, Richard Stallman's line is that the MIT license restricts your freedom as a software developer and a software user, and the GPL protects it. It's backwards double-think.
This is an example of protectionist politics: the SFC is afraid of the precedent by which a work of non-GPL status constructed in such a way would somehow not be forced to release under GPL. Then someone might find a way around gettext by linking against a stub library with the same ABI and then distributing with the actual gettext in a repo (the weak argument for GPL provisions about dynamic linking is ridiculous, and only survives by continuing to play on the ignorance of judges; when the judges realize you're laughing at their stupidity, they will be *very* unhappy with you).
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It's not like Stallman makes no sense. Imagine 2 societies. Society A in which you are free to enter into any contract want, and society B which is exactly like Society A except that contracts that involve slavery are not legal. Which society has more freedom?
Society A provides the additional freedom to to sell oneself into slavery, so society A is more free.
Society B lacks the freedom to to sell oneself into slavery, so society B is more free.
Which of these statements is true? It's just a pointless semantic debate that depends on your personal definition of a "free society". Is agreeing to use commercial software similar selling yourself into slavery? Not really, but I think it's still an appropriate analogy even if the magnitude of the consequences are not comparable.
You are free to do with the software as you see fit, as long as you do not distribute it.
That means you can alter the software and use it for commercial purposes or whatever, as long as you don't distribute it doesn't matter.
Once you start distributing you have to follow the rest of the license, which states that all the sources must be available and whatever else it is that makes ZFS incompatible.
The freedom in this case refers to the users freedom to obtain the sources etc.
Not the programmers freedom to do what he wants.
Yes, but just because you didn't say it doesn't mean the GP can't have a rant at you as if you mentioned speech and set up an entire straw man arguing with you about fires in theaters!
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
You seem to take issue with the idea of copyright in general. Copy "left" is an attempt to use the infrastructure created to support copyrights against itself. You should rail against proprietary software loudest, then "open" but not free licenses, etc., before finally coming down against GPL (leaving only MIT/BSD-ish licenses without your scorn).
Also, it's disingenuous to not include slander in speech: (a) it's not clear at the time whether or not it's slander, and (b) one might for the same reason not include "what would otherwise be speech, but is not because it violates the GPL." It's like excluding squares from rectangles.
It would be if he'd ever said anything of the sort, which he hasn't. His only objections to licenses like the MIT license is they open the potential for someone to produce a closed fork of your work, he has absolutely no moral objection to it, and the statement he thinks it restricts your freedom is 100% false.
Is he Stallman, or Strawman? Because half the stuff posted here about what he supposedly believes seems to fit the latter.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
Historically, there's been things like the original Andrew filesystem
module: a standard filesystem that really wasn't written for Linux in the
first place, and just implements a UNIX filesystem. Is that derived just
because it got ported to Linux that had a reasonably similar VFS interface
to what other UNIXes did? Personally, I didn't feel that I could make that
judgment call. Maybe it was, maybe it wasn't, but it clearly is a gray
area.
Personally, I think that case wasn't a derived work, and I was willing to
tell the AFS guys so.
http://yarchive.net/comp/linux...
ZFS was clearly developed for a different operating system, and I don't think Linus would care. If he does, I'd like to see something he has written on the subject.
Unless there is a copyright holder with reason and "standing" to sue, there is no violation.
If I may adapt the quote above from Mr. Orwell, I think you just said "Freedom is Licensing Restrictions."
I don't think licensing restrictions are necessary bad - let's just not adopt doublethink along the way. Then again, I fully respect your freedom to doublethink as much as you want. ;-)
Actually, you don't need to make up crazy analogies about worms and apples and beans here. Just look at how the Nvidia proprietary kernel modules are shipped, and how they've been shipped for over a decade now. Nvidia's driver also links to the kernel as a dynamically-loaded module (nvidia.ko). Is anyone complaining? Outside of a few extremists, no.
This situation with ZFS is no different than the situation with Nvidia.
Freedom of speech is a limit on government. Government cannot say "you cannot insult the flag | president | religion | x"
Now Twitter or Facebook or Slashdot can remove people from their service for whatever reason. If we run a blog and find a contributor to be abusive or simply annoying we can remove him from our service and this is not a freedom of speech issue.
Now if I slander you. The government cannot prosecute me for saying what I said but YOU can say that my slander caused you financial harm and try to recoup said loses. Slander is knowingly (AFAIK its "knowingly") telling falsehoods about another and causing financial harm due to said falsehoods.
Example you're a programmer: and I say that you put backdoors into everything you write; insert malware and then blackmail clients to remove the malware. As a result of my lies you lost business. Therefore you can sue me for slander. Of course the flip-side to that is that I could be telling the truth and you could still sue me for slander - but that's another story.
If you're scared of your govt then you need to further restrict its powers
Vote 3rd Party in 2016 and beyond
Slander is a civil tort, not a criminal issue, so freedom of speech doesn't apply. You might have more traction if say criminal copyright laws violate freedom of speech (as opposed to civil enforcement).
The OP made a blanket statement about freedom(s). Therefore mentioning an individual freedom is logical statement.
OP said that "All X are Y."
I countered that by saying that X1 is not Y. Which therefore contradicts OP's original statement.
If you're scared of your govt then you need to further restrict its powers
Vote 3rd Party in 2016 and beyond
You're all faggots. Fuck off.
This is what I get for feeding trolls. The OP to which I'm responding seemed to think that the GPL somehow limited what you can do with software. I was pointing out that it only limits *distribution*. Combining two pieces of software to make a derivative work *is* changing the software albeit not in the way we normally think about it. There's no doubt that some licenses cannot be combined with GPL to make a work that is derivative of the two. SFC argues that Linux kernel + ZFS = derivative work that can't possibly be distributed in compliance with both licenses. Smarter heads argue that this isn't a derivative work. But neither is relevant in terms of the OP since neither license limits what you can do with the software only how you can distribute it.
Yes, just like personal freedom doesn't let me find out where you live and murder you in your sleep.
Well if we want people to use software, you're unlikely to achieve it by setting a record for the most number of f bombs in a single post. TFA (yes I read it) asserts that what Canonical is doing qualifies as creating a derivative work. Other posters (in less colorful language) have managed to make a distinction between a distribution that combines multiple works and a derivative work. Hopefully moderation will pull those posts up and yours down.
I've had arguments with this guy. He has definitely said things to that effect. A less-direct statement to that effect is written into the preamble of the GPLv2; I've only ever gotten the full potato out of RMS by arguing with him directly about the MIT and BSD licenses. The man could feed the Irish.
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Almost all of the code isn't his.
I am a lawyer, but this is not legal advice. If you want legal advice, pay my retainer.
There is a *really* big hole in the analysis.
Linux is *not* quite GPL; it, like many others, is better understood as "quasi-GPL", or QGPL.
Since pretty much the beginning, the Linux developers approved, condoned, and encouraged binary, non-GPL modules. Standard legal analysis means that this trumps the boilerplate of the license/contract.
The second serious error is arguing about the FSF position on linking. Under the rules of legal analysis, the author of a document's opinion is weighted at pretty much nothing: the author had his chance, and later comments are irrelevant. That is, there are about 7 billion people whose opinions on interpreting it come first.
Now whether distributing Linux with that module violates Sun's CDL could be an entirely different issue; I've never looked at it.
hawk, esq.
Of course the flip-side to that is that I could be telling the truth and you could still sue me for slander
In the U.S. (unlike some other nation/states (I'm looking at you, U.K.), the Truth is a Complete Defense to an allegation of Slander.
IOW, in the U.S., at least, if you, as the Defendant in a Defamation of Character Suit, can provide evidence that what you said/wrote WAS in fact, true, the Plaintiff's lawsuit will be Dismisssed.
Freedom of speech is meaningless if it's merely the freedom to say what's uncontroversial. Everyone, everywhere has had freedom of uncontroversial speech.
GPL/Copyleft advocates can say this is illegal; but must also admit that fears of contamination are well-founded. Alternatively, they can permit proprietary modules and continue to argue (as they usually do) that fears of contamination are not well founded. Any other combination of arguments is hypocritical, inconsistent, whatever you want to call it.
That's right. Those bitches don't get a say.
"I am a lawyer, but this is not legal advice. If you want legal advice, pay my retainer."
The software world could learn a lot from that statement. Of course, if we acted like lawyers we'd have no Open Source or GPL to argue about in the first place.
"I am a software developer, but this is not software I'm writing for you. If you want software, pay my salary/consulting fee."
Yes and no.
"the Linux developers approved, condoned, and encouraged binary, non-GPL modules". You could argue that Linus has known all along that Linux distributions included binary, non-GPL modules (say NVIDIA video drivers?) They've known products were being distributed that aren't under the GPL license.
But no one is arguing that these products (NVIDIA) SHOULD be under the GPL license. So...no harm, no foul?
Flip side of the coin. Other products (NVIDIA) isn't arguing that the Linux Kernel should be invalidated against the GPL. (In theory, they could...but that wouldn't grant them a license to use the Linus Kernel. They could argue that their product (NVIDIA) can't be distributed with the Linux Kernel however. They could try to argue damages - but that would be pretty difficult given that they give product away for free as well.
So...now - let's look ZFS. Licensed under CDDL. Given away fro free.
SFC is arguing that ZFS owners COULD argue that giving away ZFS with Linux would violate the GPL. Yeah....so what? At that point Canonical apologies and pulls ZFS.
Damages? Maybe. I'm not sure I see how...but if Canonical is up to take the risk...the OWNER of ZFS could only attack Canonical for their actions. They CAN'T get any additional rights to Linux...Canonical doesn't own 'em.
The thing is "Linux" isn't that of a single party and the copyrights are held by many. I'm not sure I'd jump to the conclusion that there isn't a legal argument here. Though I'm not a lawyer- but lawyers often have different legal opinions too so....
I also think you jumped to the conclusion that they actually thought that the author of the license opinion matters. It may not, but that doesn't make the author legally wrong either.
All Canonical needs to do is to is to distribute the ZFS module as source-only, and have their install scripts build and install the binary module during the OS installation process. Doing this should get around the Oracle licensing restrictions and allow distribution with the GPLv2 kernel (and GPLv3 GNU utilities).
I take it then that the use of words you find naughty offends you more than the douchebaggery of the Software Freedom Conservancy?
"The CDDL cannot apply to the Linux kernel because zfs.ko is a self-contained file system module — the kernel itself is quite obviously not a derivative work of this new file system." ref
Both of you are wrong. You don't have to agree to the license to use the software. You only have to comply with the license if you distribute the software.
If you support copyright you should support the restriction. I don't necessarily support copyright generally speaking- but to the extant that I do its only of works licensed under copyleft free software licenses. Copyleft licenses enforce in law the intent of copyright (to promote the arts and sciences). Proprietary licenses don't do that in my opinion. I believe that to the limited extant that copyright is allowed these copyleft licenses should only be enforceable against commercial activity. That is to say you can do what you like (ie piracy of GPL software is not a crime, unless it's in combination with commercial activity of any sort, so adding advertising to a GPL program and giving it away would be commercial activity if your profiting off the sale of advertising) so long as you do not gain from it financially. I don't believe we should be utilizing violence (which the law is) against people. We should only utilize it against commercial activities (ie to seize the assets or goods derived from such activities).
Freedom of Speech is a concept that is thousands of years old, and is not specific to governments.
You're probably thinking of the US First Amendment, which is a limitation on government that is broadly aligned with the concept of Freedom of Speech, and mentions the concept by name, but does not invent it or control all uses of the term.
You'd actually be wrong. The FSF and SFLC have paid for and represent several developers who have made contributions to the Linux kernel. The SFLC is actually representing a developer in Germany whose got kernel contributions and whom copyright was violated by Oracle.
If I may adapt the quote above from Mr. Orwell, I think you just said "Freedom is Licensing Restrictions."
I definitely didn't say that. I said that it's a semantic debate (i.e. rather than a substantive debate).
I presented both sides in order to show that, and I didn't even take a side.
Since pretty much the beginning, the Linux developers approved, condoned, and encouraged binary, non-GPL modules. Standard legal analysis means that this trumps the boilerplate of the license/contract.
I am NOT a lawyer, and i know better than to make very stupid statements like that;
- Non GPL modules where not tolerated in the beginning, the issue didnt come up until 10 years after the project started. (Linux wasnt created the moment corporations notices)
- Can you cite an example where there has been any sort of consensus of developers have encouraged non-GPL or binary modules ?
- Tolerating copyright violators does not invalidate copyright law in any way, it might justify lower penalties.
- In what jurisdiction do you claims apply ?
I am just trying to better explain slashpings claim, which you did not seem to understand. Slander laws are a good example of the complimentary nature of freedoms. Slander laws grant a limited freedom to silence people (when they are being slanderous), thereby reducing "the freedom of speech" to "the freedom of non-slanderous speech".
You can also show that your claim was satire, and that no reasonable person could mistake your claim to be serious. For example, you can say that Donald Trump's father was an orangutan. That said, I think slander laws are pretty stupid, and I don't think the benefit we gain from them is worth the diminished state of our freedom of speech.
I really wish the GPL zealots would stop trying to limit the freedoms of those of us who don't subscribe to their particular brand of fundamentalism.
Of course the flip-side to that is that I could be telling the truth and you could still sue me for slander
In the U.S. (unlike some other nation/states (I'm looking at you, U.K.), the Truth is a Complete Defense to an allegation of Slander.
IOW, in the U.S., at least, if you, as the Defendant in a Defamation of Character Suit, can provide evidence that what you said/wrote WAS in fact, true, the Plaintiff's lawsuit will be Dismisssed.
They can still sue, but they likely won't win.
Sorry, my bad. I should have read your response more carefully. Then again, as Bill Clinton said, "It all depends on what the meaning of the word 'is' is." ;-)
Under the provisions of the TPP, the SFS is now guilty of enabling violations of copyright, as they espouse modifications of copyright held by parties != themselves.
Nicely done SFS! Happy prison time!
It's worth mentioning that a subset of the Linux kernel copyright holders, including some of the most influential and prolific contributors, believe that the situation around the binary modules from Nvidia, AMD, etc. is similar to this ZFS module.
Just because it's gone unchallenged for a number of years doesn't mean that the issue is settled or buried. It's never been challenged or ruled-on in court AFAIK, and until it has, it's anyone's guess what the law will actually decide when interpreting the GPLv2 and copyright law.
It really doesn't matter if you want to label individuals as "extremist" for thinking a particular way about the law, though I'll admit that's a better term than Barbara's use of the term "freetard" -- again, namecalling just weakens one's argument. The only thing that matters is the way that a judge will ultimately interpret the relevant texts to determine if there is any violation of law, and what the penalties are if so.
No - what he just said was "Some licensing restrictions can prevent you from giving up other freedoms that are more important"
Freedom is not an absolute concrete concept - neither is "Software Freedom". The "Freedom" that Stallman wants, is the freedom to modify and fix any software he uses. In order to achieve that _particular_ freedom, you may need to add restrictions to yourself - like not using any software that _doesn't_ allow you to modify and fix it. That's not doublethink. That's just understanding the actual context of the word, instead of deciding it means something different to what it was supposed to in this case.
However, Stallman is still a dick, most of the time - and I don't buy his argument that "Someone might take this and make it so I can't modify and fix it" as a reason to not use it right now. I won't use that hypothetical closed future version, but I will use the actually existing open version right now.
Alan Cox has made clear from pretty much the moment that this issue came up that he considered binary modules to be derivative of the Linux kernel. While he has AFAIK not taken this view to court, he has certainly neither approved, condoned, nor encouraged binary, non-GPL modules.
Finally! A year of moderation! Ready for 2019?
If it's more important to try and push an open source but restrictive license down everyone's throat (hey, the GPL is great for some things, but horrible for others), then perhaps Ubuntu could come up with a variant that uses Debian's kFreeBSD distribution as a base instead?
It's a shame though, I thought the general spirit was to make great things available to the masses and to drive innovation.
You just can't *distribute* the changes.
You can't help your neighbor by compiling this for them and giving it to them you *must* make them do it themselves and if they are not in a position to do that then it's bad luck for them. That is a poor choice because what you would produce for them exactly is the same thing you expect them to produce for themself but they must do the work even though you have already done it. It is the same "you wouldnt steal a car" idiocy propagated by the RIAA/MPAA except in this case there is not even any percieved "loss" (by definition of "lost sales" due to piracy), it is just other people imposing their will on you and your neighbor despite their not even being the flimsiest claim of loss (like the RIAA/MPAA have with their claims of lost profits).
You're a dipshit.
The profession was "invented" because a few hundred years ago most people were completely uneducated, frequently didn't know their rights, and were unable to read them IF they managed to get access to them. A lawyer's job was to put those people on equal footing with the remainder of the judicial system.
From what I can see as long as the default distribution install is GPL compliant anything else is a user selectable customisation. For example cars that meet strict design regulations when sold by a dealer will often if prompted by the buyer modify the car that often leads to the car not comply with the regulations the car was certified under (just changing the exhaust can do this).
I mostly agree with your assessment. I believe NVIDA has a pass because they use a totally standard kernel interface to do everything (I thought in the posts where Linus discusses it, it was read/write). So they developed an entirely independently and then pass data back and forth through a stable API. Otherwise, it includes now Linux source code.
This is very different than other kernel drivers which are tightly hooked into the kernel and use lots of kernel functionality and APIs (like the days when the Hypervisor wasn't distributed with mainline kernel source). I believe this standard, and Linus's assertion that he doesn't consider it a derived work are what makes NVIDA special. The question is does ZFS meet the same standard. In this case, I know the code was developed entirely independently, but it isn't clear to me how cleanly separated it is from the rest of the Linux internals.
Since pretty much the beginning, the Linux developers approved, condoned, and encouraged binary, non-GPL modules.
Being a lawyer doesn't make you out of touch. "Linux developers" have never approved of or encouraged binary, non-GPL modules, quite the contrary. Tolerated, or looked the other way is the most you could say. Linus has at times expressed a permissive attitude, but he has also said this. What you need to remember is that it's not Linus's kernel, it's only partly his. Anyone who holds copyright in it (thousands) is entitled to make an issue of illegal distribution if they wish.
When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
It's definitely a mess, but so is just about anything where the GPL has been around.
As for authority and jurisdiction: the Common Law of England goes back to the twelfth century, and has been passed on to substantially all English speaking countries (I forget the exceptions). The principles of construction predate this country, and are pretty much the same through the english speaking world.
Frankly, if someone wanted to litigate this, it would be an utter mess. The unwritten changes that *did* become part of the license would be binding upon all later contributions, and attach to them. It is quite possible that different parts have different licenses--and that the whole body of the kernel couldn't be distributed together. *noone* wants to open *that* can of worms . . .(except maybe redmond :)
hawk
Just run FreeBSD or PC-BSD. Then you won't have whiny prepubescent Freetards whining that everything included isn't free as in communism adhering to "the one true license". A separate kernel module is not the same as compiling it inline in the kernel. This type of crap is one reason I avoid the Linux community. The other reason is that most Linux distros are a sloppy patchwork fragmented mess in perpetual beta and BSD is just so much cleaner.
The SFC holds lot of copyrights given freely by kernel developers. Is it really that hard to read the internet, or are you just a trolling drolling idiot all the time.
The comparison to slavery is completely ridiculous. You are totally free to not use proprietary software and/or to discontinue its use if and when you see fit and to even use it only for specific cases and in specific envrionments for specific timeframes. Slaves were not free to just not be slaves when they didn't want to be anymore.
Sounds more like you're arguing that bondage should be illegal because it allows people to enter and exit "slavery" as they see fit.
Also, while I'm at it, to the extent that some invited, while others tolerated, aside from introducing different licenses with the problem that that creates, leads to the issue of "estoppel"--a situation in which one cannot assert a position, even if legally entitled to do so, do to his prior actions and/or the reliance of another upon those actions. (and for those who care, estoppel is an equitable principle, not a legal principle, having come from the Chancery Courts of England).
All in all, anyone who thinks that they would like the results of the litigation is deluding himself . . .
hawk
It will be a length battle if this case go to court. I think Canonical have more to gain than SFS
The matter of non-GPL binary loadable kernel modules is of big importance to any Linux distributor.
There are multiples examples of this usage on Linux, especially graphic binary blobs (NVIDIA, AMD,etc).
I don’t think, arbitrary, any binary module can be argued as a “derivative work” of Linux kernel, it will be very difficult to hold this argument on court.
The ZFS module has been ported from Solaris not developed from scratch for Linux, arguing it is derivative is not obvious (the same apply to NVIDIA and AMD graphic drivers, ported from Windows).
The interpretation of FSF or SFS is mere one of many. Only in a court this interpretations will be sedimented.
Mmm, you seem correct up until that last bit. Stallman's problem with non-GPL open licenses is that they lack or don't have as strong protections against redistribution. He does have an essay where he says that proprietary software is morally wrong. IIRC he also makes the link to licenses that don't prevent proprietary software. If not in that particular essay, then in other writings.
You can also show that your claim was satire, and that no reasonable person could mistake your claim to be serious. For example, you can say that Donald Trump's father was an orangutan. That said, I think slander laws are pretty stupid, and I don't think the benefit we gain from them is worth the diminished state of our freedom of speech.
Yeah, you're right, I wasn't thinking. And also, it is also a rebuttable defense that the target is a public/famous figure, and that they lose a measure of defamation-protection.
Of course the flip-side to that is that I could be telling the truth and you could still sue me for slander
In the U.S. (unlike some other nation/states (I'm looking at you, U.K.), the Truth is a Complete Defense to an allegation of Slander.
IOW, in the U.S., at least, if you, as the Defendant in a Defamation of Character Suit, can provide evidence that what you said/wrote WAS in fact, true, the Plaintiff's lawsuit will be Dismisssed.
They can still sue, but they likely won't win.
Exactly. I meant to make that point, but forgot.
ZFS is the killer app for the BSD folks... If it gained widespread distribution you could kiss BSD goodbye... Ok that's an exaggeration, these SFC loonies need to go check in at the front desk. Who let them out of their cage??
No, but insistence on unnecessarily colourful invective might lead others to suspect that your issues are emotional rather than rational in nature.
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
"Legal advice" is a formal term, defined by law, and it's actually illegal to offer it if you're not a lawyer in many places. Furthermore, for a lawyer, giving such advice can be constituted as establishing an attorney-client relationship, which results in legal obligations for the lawyer. So, even ignoring the time and effort, it's never free for them. I would assume there is some kind of insurance that exist specifically to indemnify lawyers in cases where they become subject to such obligations; and, naturally, that insurance is not free.
Software developers, on the other hand, don't establish this kind of relationship with the user merely by virtue of writing software for them. At least, not any more so than anyone else providing any other service does.
(I am not a lawyer, and this is not legal advice.)
I can read a binary as well as a CPU can, so why _must_ I have the source? In any case, I don't want the GPL dictating what I can and can't run on my computer, and disrupting distribution is the surest way to do that.
What's important is if anyone is going to sue over it. The only people who can sure are those who have standing. Arguably, Linus himself has the most standing, and his position is the pragmatic one: he doesn't mind modules linking to the kernel, though they can't declare themselves GPL and use the GPL-only interfaces if they're not. He's even given Nvidia the middle finger in one interview because he wasn't a big fan of their proprietary route, but he's never talked about suing them or causing any legal problems, and since then from what I've read they've actually helped out with the Nouveau drivers some.
The issue isn't going to be ruled on in court until someone with standing sues over it. And if they haven't done so by now with Nvidia and AMD, I don't see why they'd start now. They'd only be hurting the cause for Linux proliferation. Having more software working in Linux is a good thing for the users. The only people who are against this are the extremists, and none of them seem to do any kernel work. So they can whine all they want, but no one cares, and they'll be laughed out of court if they try to bring a lawsuit.
I think it's pretty clear that "freedom" means different things to different people. I think "is" means the same thing to everyone except Bill.
In this example slavery is not analogous to the use of proprietary software, it's analogous to agreeing to the license of proprietary software, which you can't unagree to.
Sounds more like you're arguing that bondage should be illegal because it allows people to enter and exit "slavery" as they see fit.
I am arguing is that it's a semantic debate, and neither side is right or wrong.
You seem to be unaware that in every case where the GPL has been litigated, it has been upheld. You talk about common law, surely you understand how this rich body of legal precedent has buttressed the strength of the GPL. As for estoppel, it's not enough for some of the copyright holders to make a habit of looking the other way. All of them would need to, and that simply hasn't happened.
When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
...you could try relying on the statute of limitations and hope that nobody notices some quiet little misdeed for a sufficient number of years...
When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
I am a lawyer, but this is not legal advice. If you want legal advice, pay my retainer.
Can I just shoot you int he fucking face instead?
So explain EXPORT_SYMBOL vs EXPORT_SYMBOL_GPL.
Same kernel developers recognized that there are standard parts of how loadable modules interface to the kernel. Ardent wishes by others (like Alan Cox) do not set aside that reality.
In this example slavery is not analogous to the use of proprietary software, it's analogous to agreeing to the license of proprietary software, which you can't unagree to.
Of course you can. You can't use the software without agreeing to its license stipulations, if you no longer agree you no longer use it. Just like your license to use the road, you must agree to the license conditions and if you don't then you do not use the road and if you "unagree" you cease to use the road. Slaves can't just "no longer agree" and then not be bound by slavery anymore. Using proprietary software - or the road for that matter - under the specified licensing conditions is a choice, slavery is not.
Don't look at Nutanix. They are flat out embedding ZFS with KVM in their next 4.6 product release.
Of course you can. You can't use the software without agreeing to its license stipulations, if you no longer agree you no longer use it.
That's may be true for some conditions. Other conditions might promises not to reverse engineer the software. I don't think this means that you are allowed by the license to reverse engineer the software once you stop using it.
Using proprietary software - or the road for that matter - under the specified licensing conditions is a choice, slavery is not.
Historically, slavery, for the vast majority of people, has not been a choice (neither entering nor exiting it). That doesn't mean it can't be a choice. There are no doubt people who makes decisions for various reasons that they know for whatever reason will lead to their enslavement. There are also probably people who forego the opportunity to become freed from slavery for various reasons.
This historical aspect of slavery rarely involving choice, is not the focus of my analogy.
If you really can't let it go, then try to imagine some other kind of slavery like thing that involves the freedom to restrict your own freedoms.
Also, while I'm at it, to the extent that some invited, while others tolerated, aside from introducing different licenses with the problem that that creates, leads to the issue of "estoppel"--a situation in which one cannot assert a position, even if legally entitled to do so, do to his prior actions and/or the reliance of another upon those actions.
I find it highly unlikely that estoppel would stick to anyone but those that have done it to themselves. If I write some GPLv2 code without contributing it to the kernel, somebody else says hey GPLv2 that's compatible and add it to the kernel they got no authority to alter the license to "quasi-GPL" and whoever is relying on the "quasi-GPL" can't use their actions as estoppel to halt my lawsuit since it's not my actions. And since it's open source and free for distribution to anyone, there's no technical action or inaction to indicate permission. The only question is if legal inaction could lead to some form of estoppel, but even then it'd probably be a limitation on damages. If it's in violation of copyright, they still have to cease violating it. Unless you have some kind of promissory estoppel, but I don't think anyone has made that kind of promises on behalf of the whole project.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Totally by chance, I'm watching an old Cantrill presentation (2011) and he'd got a slide at 24m28 which reads:
Fork Yeah! The Rise and Development of illumos
He calls CDDL "file-based copyleft" and says it was explicitly designed to allow combined works with proprietary elements.
It's true that PHP include statements do not involve the merging of executable binary objects into a single native executable object. This does not change its fundamental nature that executable programs of PHP are loaded together (linked together) to form a single program. The fact that the defacto implementation of the PHP language is an interpreter rather than being a native machine language compiler does not change this. In fact language interpreters/translators/compilers are not an inherent property of any language, these are implementation specific decisions; one can write a C language interpreter and one may also write a Perl language -> machine executable code compiler if they wanted. Well the "PHP include system" loads in PHP files in the same fashion as a binary linker: the result is a full program that is loaded into memory as a single program as opposed to being dumped to disk file and a native executable object.
That's may be true for some conditions. Other conditions might promises not to reverse engineer the software. I don't think this means that you are allowed by the license to reverse engineer the software once you stop using it.
So you think you can reverse engineer the software so long as you don't agree to the license?
Historically, slavery, for the vast majority of people, has not been a choice (neither entering nor exiting it). That doesn't mean it can't be a choice.
But it isn't, that's why it's not analagous to slavery because in order for it to be you need to redefine slavery to mean you have a choice about whether you want to be a slave or not.
If you really can't let it go, then try to imagine some other kind of slavery like thing that involves the freedom to restrict your own freedoms.
I have control of my freedoms, I have all the choice, that is the complete opposite of slavery. You think I feel enslaved just because I can't come into your house and just pee all over your walls? I - like most people - are quite happy to restrict my freedom to do that, to suggest this is anything even close to slavery is just complete idiocy.
Reminds me of a related issue: the FSF's position on linking (which will not impact the issue at hand: ZFS in Ubuntu, but has been raised in different contexts).
Basically, WordPress allows non-GPL modules even though WordPress itself is GPL. The FSF does not like that, and they hold that to extend a GPL application, every extension must be GPL, and they invoke the linking interpretation. Drupal on the other hand, takes the position that all modules must be GPL.
The linking interpretation makes sense when you have A depend on B, and B is proprietary and you can't run A without B, or you can't inspect B at all since you don't have the source code for it. But an extension is the other way. It is not essential for the main application to run, it is optional. Also, the linking interpretation was done in the days before dynamic linking (.so) was possible, and everything was static (.a). And now, we have things like WordPress and Drupal which are written in interpreted languages such as PHP, and you have the source code already.
That linking interpretation is archaic and needs to be expanded or reevaluated.
2bits.com, Inc: Drupal, WordPress, and LAMP performance tuning.
The Linux Foundation is not "THE" copyright holder of the Linux kernel. Linus has never required copyright assignments from contributors and therefore every single programmer/organization who contributed code retains copyright in their contribution. They as individuals get to decide when (or if) they want to bring legal action against potential infringers of their copyright. Your lack of knowledge of this basic fact makes me wonder what your profession is. Some of those contributors undoubtedly support SFC's interpretation.
Whether they have the time/resources to actually sue is a different matter.
He says no such thing. He says that liberal free software licenses (MIT, BSD, XLib) are not immoral of themselves. He says that anybody who takes advantage of forking such software into a proprietary software distribution are immoral: these distributors are immoral, not the users of the software. Stallman says that user freedoms are not guaranteed by liberal free software licenses; users must judge their freedom for every instance of the liberal-licensed software on a case-by-case basis.
With the GPL this is not the case. In all cases of GPL3+ software, users can expect to have the four specific users freedom with the software. If there is ever a case of a GPL program that doesn't respect the users' freedom, the distributor of that specific program is liable to copyright infringement of the copyright holder.
So explain EXPORT_SYMBOL vs EXPORT_SYMBOL_GPL
Walling off non-GPL-compliant modules from a good part of the kernel is a rather direct expression of disapproval, don't you think? This in no way blesses the practices of violators, it is simply a pragmatic way to decrease their comfort. Tainting is in the same category.
When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
So you think you can reverse engineer the software so long as you don't agree to the license?
According to who? The license or the law?
But it isn't, that's why it's not analagous to slavery because in order for it to be you need to redefine slavery to mean you have a choice about whether you want to be a slave or not.
That's definitely not true. Nearly all cars have steering wheels. That doesn't mean a car is defined by a having a steering steering wheel. It doesn't mean that a car without a steering wheel is redefining what a car is. It shouldn't be that hard to imagine a scenario where a person makes a choice to be enslaved.
I have control of my freedoms, I have all the choice, that is the complete opposite of slavery. You think I feel enslaved just because I can't come into your house and just pee all over your walls? I - like most people - are quite happy to restrict my freedom to do that, to suggest this is anything even close to slavery is just complete idiocy.
I really don't see how this statement has anything to do with anything I've said.
In some places you don't have control over *all* your freedoms. In some places you are prevented from entering into a contract where you enslave yourself (e.g. like in the US). This is maybe a good freedom to restrict, as sacrificing this freedom will ensure the preservation of your other freedoms, but it is nonetheless a freedom that is denied to you.
Denying a person the freedom to shoot themselves in the foot may help to preserve other freedoms that person may have (e.g. freedom to walk), but it is nonetheless a restriction on that persons freedom.
So You Are A Lawyer. That's nice for you. But...
> It's definitely a mess, but so is just about anything where the GPL has been around. ...you clearly seem to be a biased lawyer. Now guess which grade of trust I put on biased lawyers.
The Conservancy seem to have glossed over this point. It is not obvious to me. If Canonical were to distribute two, CDs, tarballs, whatever, with Linux on one and ZFS.ko on the other, with a script to load ZFS.ko at install time would _that_ be different?
How about if they distribute Ubuntu on one CD, the ZFS source on the other and a script that builds and loads ZFS.ko at install time? Would _that_ be legal?
If you can distribute linux with binary blob graphics drivers I don't see a big difference with a filesystem module.
softcoder
Really great post. This answered the majority of my questions. When I read this I actually opened up a word document and started taking notes haha. also go through this link http://localclienttakeover.com...
* your
Since pretty much the beginning, the Linux developers approved, condoned, and encouraged binary, non-GPL modules
Is not even remotely true. Greg KH and Alan Cox have both stated publicly that this is not the case, but more formally the kernel has an explicit set of symbol annotations for things that they consider to be public interfaces (which do not therefore invoke the GPL, because - possibly modulo the recent Oracle ruling - interfaces can not be copyrighted and so being a derived work of something that is not copyrighted can not spread the GPL, and even without this the Linux kernel license contains an explicit exemption for these interfaces). Anything that interacts with code that is not part of these interfaces is a derived work of the kernel and covered by the requirements of the GPL. Given how deeply ZFS must hook into the VM and VFS subsystems to work, it's pretty likely that it requires touching GPL'd parts.
Companies like nVidia sidestep this, because the GPL is a distribution license. They provide a binary blob, most of which is developed as part of a cross-platform effort and so is not a derived work of the kernel. They also distribute a shim. The shim is a derived work of the kernel, and the parts of the blob that talk to the shim could possibly be argued to be derived works of the shim, but the only license that would be violated if they were would be the GPL on the shim, and so the only person with standing to sue nVidia would be nVidia. The fact that they've had to jump through these hoops to do so is evidence that not doing so would not be condoned by the various copyright holders of the kernel. I challenge you to find one example of a binary-only kernel module that is distributed with the awareness and consent of the Linux copyright holders and uses anything other than the interfaces declared public.
The CDDL is a per-file license, so may be linked with code under any license without issues unless those issues come from the other license.
I am not a lawyer, but I've spent enough time with IP lawyers to have had most of these discussions before.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
No, I think the distinction expressly codifies what parts of the kernel are generic "kernel" interfaces and what parts are Linux-specific (and thus imply derivative work status). Otherwise there would be no reason to make that distinction, or to allow modules to declare non-GPL licence status.
Not only that, but the NVidia binary driver is based on their Windows driver. It doesn't even work with Linux.
On top of both the kernel and the binary driver they build a shim, which is licensed as GPL + exception for linking with the binary driver.
Oracle could do the same for ZFS (or they could change the license, since - unlike NVidia - the source is available), but they won't. ZFS is under the CDDL license which does not allow linking with GPL code, so a shim like NVidias cannot be made without Oracles blessing. To comply with both licenses, such a shim would have to be (GPL and not CDDL), and (CDDL and not GPL) at the same time.
TL;DR: NVidia can do it because they can set the license for their half of the code to work around the problem. Oracle could do the same, but Ubuntu can't because they don't own either part of the code.
Don't be in doubt that the NVidia lawyers made sure that only the shim is a derived work of the driver, never the other way around.
Likely the people who develop the driver are not even allowed to LOOK at the shim, to ensure that nobody could argue that the driver is in any way derived from the shim.
I don't see where they're not adhering to the respective licenses. "Distribution" of a piece of software is reasonable to be restricted to the distribution of that specific piece of software, not it's inclusion in a larger distribution through a combination of software. If modifications are made to a specific piece of a "distribution" of a paricular project then that is what the license on that specific piece of software covers. When combined within a collection of pieces of software published under the GPL or any other license that does not apply to the collection just because one of them might have been released under a GPL or CDDL license, just the specific elements. The incompatibility does not come from the projects. GPL zealots beware!
It is very different, in that Nvidia owns the copyrights to their driver, and are willing to jump through the hoops necessary to avoid the pitfalls, including keeping the driver and the kernel separate and have a shim with a license that allows linking to both.
Canonical, on the other hand, does not own ZFS, and Oracle (who does) are not willing to jump through any such hoops. Quite the opposite, they (or rather Sun, which is now owned by Oracle) specifically wrote a license to make sure such a shim could not be distributed (it would have to be GPL and CDDL at the same time, and the licenses are incompatible).
Whether or not they're correct, their argument comes down to "we think we're right." The issue isn't whether the licenses are incompatible (I doubt anyone disputes that) but whether or not a kernel module is a necessarily derivative work of the kernel (because that must be true for the license incompatibility to matter). And here is what they say about that:
And there you have it. If you agree with them (and why wouldn't you? It's "quite obvious" so therefore that settles it) then they're preaching to the choir and you can applaud now. If you disagree with them (and side with Canonical) then .. oh my, you're in a "minority position."
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
You folks never fail to disappoint me. Every time I express this general point of view, my post gets marked as a "Troll." Did anybody ever consider that I might just be expressing my honest opinion? It amazes me that folks who are all enthused about the abstract concept of "software freedom" don't really much care about a more concrete thing "freedom of speech."
(Note to "Moderators": Go ahead, make my day.)
Fair enough. I just wish Mr. Stallman would coin a new word for whatever it is he means by "freedom." Like so much of the terminology he co-opts, I have a hard time wrapping my head around his concepts when he uses words for them that mean something different than the meanings we were all taught in grade school. For example, in grade school, "free" meant "free, as in the lunch poor kids got" (we didn't drink beer back then - well, maybe once...) and "freedom" mean something like "the ability to do what you want to the maximum extent practical."
I'm not a lawyer, but what the heck. The following isn't even illegal advice.
What are the limits to estoppel? I write some software and notice that it's being distributed illegally. I decide I don't care, and people distribute it freely. Then, I decide that I want to stop the illegal distribution, and start firing off cease-and-desist letters. Can I stop the illegal distribution? I'm not in a good shape to sue for damages, but do I have to let the distribution continue?
Also, suppose I write some software and GPLv2 it. Over the years, some people link proprietary blobs to it and I do nothing. Then someone comes along with a new proprietary blob, and I decide "enough is enough". Does estoppel apply when a party is counting on what the copyright holder has allowed in similar situations in the past?
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
Yes and no.
"the Linux developers approved, condoned, and encouraged binary, non-GPL modules". You could argue that Linus has known all along that Linux distributions included binary, non-GPL modules (say NVIDIA video drivers?) They've known products were being distributed that aren't under the GPL license.
But no one is arguing that these products (NVIDIA) SHOULD be under the GPL license. So...no harm, no foul?
Flip side of the coin. Other products (NVIDIA) isn't arguing that the Linux Kernel should be invalidated against the GPL. (In theory, they could...but that wouldn't grant them a license to use the Linus Kernel. They could argue that their product (NVIDIA) can't be distributed with the Linux Kernel however. They could try to argue damages - but that would be pretty difficult given that they give product away for free as well.
So...now - let's look ZFS. Licensed under CDDL. Given away fro free.
SFC is arguing that ZFS owners COULD argue that giving away ZFS with Linux would violate the GPL. Yeah....so what? At that point Canonical apologies and pulls ZFS.
Damages? Maybe. I'm not sure I see how...but if Canonical is up to take the risk...the OWNER of ZFS could only attack Canonical for their actions. They CAN'T get any additional rights to Linux...Canonical doesn't own 'em.
I was thinking similar thoughts, but not so completely.
Who has standing to enforce the potential breach of license? If nobody, then it doesn't really matter. If the people with standing are the ones doing the breaching, again there is not much result.
I suppose if I ever submitted a patch to the project, I could potentially have standing, but am I likley to try to get the districution halted?
Let's look at it this way.
We have two similar pieces of software, B, which is BSD-licensed, and G, which is GPLed. Neither clearly leads to more freedom than the other.
B can be used in more situations, and is freer in that way. However, a Very Large Corporation can take the code to B, change it so the original B is incompatible, and widely publish it in proprietary form. The original isn't really useful anymore, because of the ubiquity of the incompatible version, and so people with the original B can't change and use it effectively any more. This couldn't happen with G, since VLC would have to publish its version of G with source code and permission to hack, so the GPL is freer there.
Even the GPL is subject to "freedom" arguments. Linus Torvalds has no problem with what Tivo did with the Linux kernel, since he can look through their source code and take all the good bits. Richard Stallman does, since he can't reprogram his Tivo (assuming he has one).
There are cases where something is more free than another, but BSD-style vs. copyleft licenses aren't among them. You need to pick which freedoms you most care about, and choose a license accordingly.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
Why should Oracle change it's license?
If Linux is incompatible and it is Linux that wants this, then Linux needs to change to a more permissive license. The copyleft things is kind of considered a virus by a lot people.
Enforced freedom is not freedom.
I think the distinction expressly codifies what parts of the kernel are generic "kernel" interfaces and what parts are Linux-specific (and thus imply derivative work status).
Incorrect argument. Many, in fact, the vast majority of the GPL symbols are clearly Linux-specific. So the distinction between GPL and non-GPL symbols tells you nothing about whether a work is derivative.
Otherwise there would be no reason to make that distinction, or to allow modules to declare non-GPL licence status.
Creating discomfort for GPL violators is a perfectly valid reason to make that distinction. It's very cost-effective.
When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
Stallman believes that freedom is a matter of self-control. The owners of proprietary software do not practice self-control. The owners of proprietary software ask users to take control of their computers and their lives. Users actually choose to grant them this control. Users accept this choice cannot have freedom.
It's not hard to understand the intent - it's to preserve the "Four Freedoms":
The GPL is necessary to ensure that when you get the code, you have these freedoms and can't keep them from anyone you distribute code to.
The part I really disagree with is that dynamic linking creates a derivative work. Part of the freedom to "run the program for any purpose" in my book includes using the program with other programs that may not be GPL licensed, including plug-ins and extensions.
What part of my argument is incorrect? EXPORT_SYMBOL_GPL(foo) means that, technically, the kernel will only expose "foo" to modules that declare a GPL-compatible license, and that, legally, the kernel developers think using that symbol means a kernel module is a derivative work of the kernel. EXPORT_SYMBOL(bar) means that, technically, the kernel will expose "foo" to any loadable kernel module, and that, legally, the kernel developers think it is a fairly generic interface for a Unix-like kernel. That they make the distinction, and allow modules to declare a license, implies that they expect GPL-incompatible kernel modules to exist. The distinction provides clarity and a measure of safety for distributors of such kernel modules, not discomfort.
The comparison of proprietary software to slavery is analogous. People choose to be bound to a software master. People who accept that choice choose to subject their computing lives to the goodwill of the software owner - if the user wants the software modified, the only thing that the user can do is beg and hope. The fact that you can choose to end the bondage at will does not change the fact that you are bound while you agree to it. Having the choice of one or many masters to be subject to doesn't change the fact that you cannot be free while you have accepted the choice.
Having the choice to stop being a slave doesn't imply you have freedom when you choose to be one.
What part of my argument is incorrect? EXPORT_SYMBOL_GPL(foo) means that, technically, the kernel will only expose "foo" to modules that declare a GPL-compatible license, and that, legally, the kernel developers think using that symbol means a kernel module is a derivative work of the kernel
There's your incorrect argument. You don't know what kernel developers actually think, and further, you don't know how it would affect legal standing even if you did. See "thought crime".
When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
Wow, you really know how to double down on the stupid. See "Donald Trump".
Or, if you prefer, see what Linus said about it.
Funny, I was thinking the same thing about you. Linus isn't "programmers", Linus is just one programmer of thousands who hold copyright in the kernel. In a legal sense, what Linus posted is "hearsay", and arguably a nice demonstration that he might be right when he claims programmers making lousy lawyers. As far as I know, intent ("willful infringement") may matter in computing copyright damages but not in deciding whether infringement actually occurred. Keep pursuing your theories about intent by all means, I doubt you will find anything of value down that path but somebody needs to do it.
When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
What Linus said may be hearsay in that one could not submit it as evidence in court, but I am not trying to do that. It merely illustrates that he, the most prominent copyright holder for Linux, agrees with me that usage of EXPORT_SYMBOL() versus EXPORT_SYMBOL_GPL() symbols is significant when it comes to determining whether a loadable kernel module is a "derivative work" of Linux in the GPLv2's sense. That kernel developers regularly debate which of those to use for which interfaces (e.g. dma-buf) indicates that his view is very widely shared.
An alleged infringer's intent has nothing to do with those annotations. They express the copyright holders' intent about the interface, and that is the intent that is relevant to figuring out whether a work is a "derived work" under the kernel's license. Keep throwing up irrelevant claims if you want, but realize that most of us can see right through them.
I have never heard any kernel developer state that the intent of non-GPL symbol exports is to encourage GPL infringement, or distribution of binary-only modules.
When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
Boy, you sure beat the hell out of that strawman!
BTW, I just noticed that my "Troll" at top generated quite a lot of interesting discussion, including one comment (by someone else) that got a "5."
You're welcome.
According to who? The license or the law?
The law, DMCA.
Nearly all cars have steering wheels. That doesn't mean a car is defined by a having a steering steering wheel. It doesn't mean that a car without a steering wheel is redefining what a car is.
Yes but you don't just point to a submarine and say it is a car. The idea of "choice" is directly contradictory to slavery, though it is becoming evident you don't understand the meaning of the word which is why you're so confused.
It shouldn't be that hard to imagine a scenario where a person makes a choice to be enslaved.
Except for anybody who knows that the definition of "enslaved" is precisely about choice and if you remove freedom of choice then you are no longer enslaved. The "choice" to be enslaved is directly contradictory to the concept of slavery.
In some places you don't have control over *all* your freedoms.
Right, and I have the freedom to choose whether I want to go there or not, that is exactly the scenario you laid out and it is absolutely not slavery because I have choice.
In some places you are prevented from entering into a contract where you enslave yoursel
Except that isn't what we are talking about because in terms of use of proprietary software you always have the freedom of choice to stop being under those conditions at any point you like, because you are not a "slave".
I like that I have the freedom to visit a museum despite not having the freedom to smash the place up when I'm there and I also like that I have the freedom to leave and go somewhere else should I feel the need to smash something up. You have to be extremely intellectually dishonest or extremely stupid to think that is in any way anything like "slavery".
Both of you are wrong. You don't have to agree to the license to use the software. You only have to comply with the license if you distribute the software.
Yup, fair point. You don't have to comply with any terms just to use it. It would have been more accurate to say that the only reason you have it at all is that the person who distributed it to you was complying with the terms.
Nope, no sig
The law, DMCA.
The DMCA does not prohibit reverse engineering. It prohibits circumventing a copy protection system. And yes I think you can reverse engineer software if you did not specifically agree not to.
Except for anybody who knows that the definition of "enslaved" is precisely about choice and if you remove freedom of choice then you are no longer enslaved [oxforddictionaries.com]. The "choice" to be enslaved is directly contradictory to the concept of slavery.
That's only true if you can't wrap your head around the idea of choosing to limit your own choices.
Right, and I have the freedom to choose whether I want to go there or not, that is exactly the scenario you laid out and it is absolutely not slavery because I have choice.
A person could choose to go to a place that has debtors prisons and choose to rack up a huge debt, and be forced into a slave labor camp. Despite the fact that this person decided to become a slave, they are a slave who no longer has freedoms nonetheless.
Except that isn't what we are talking about because in terms of use of proprietary software you always have the freedom of choice to stop being under those conditions at any point you like, because you are not a "slave".
Yeah you already said that, and I said, there are some conditions in software licenses that you can not unagree to.
I like that I have the freedom to visit a museum despite not having the freedom to smash the place up when I'm there and I also like that I have the freedom to leave and go somewhere else should I feel the need to smash something up.
I don't see what this has to do with anything I've said. The fact that you bring up this seemingly irrelevant example, makes me feel liek you aen;t understanding what I am saying.
You have to be extremely intellectually dishonest or extremely stupid to think that is in any way anything like "slavery".
Or maybe you just lack the comprehension necessary to understand what I am saying.
The comparison of proprietary software to slavery is analogous. People choose to be bound to a software master.
But you aren't "bound by a software master" any more than you are bound by the rules of a museum when you visit. Sure I can't go in there and smash the place up or change things, but calling that "slavery" is just idiotic.
The ultimate freedom lies with the user, you can debate the merits of the licenses all you want but ultimately the user has the choice and that is what is important. It doesn't matter if you are aligned with Linus' view of software freedom or RMS' view of software freedom or the BSD view of software freedom or you don't care about software freedom so long as you have choice. If you care about a software ideology then you should support and invest in that ideology, but most people don't care and those who do rarely care enough to limit themselves to that ideology alone.
And yes I think you can reverse engineer software if you did not specifically agree not to.
And that is wrong, thankfully the EFF has put together a guide here about it.
That's only true if you can't wrap your head around the idea of choosing to limit your own choices.
Wrong! I perfectly understand that I am free to visit a museum while not being free to smash the place up, why can you not understand this?
A person could choose to go to a place that has debtors prisons and choose to rack up a huge debt, and be forced into a slave labor camp.
Yes and a person could choose to murder somebody and be forced into a prison, we are all bound by the consequences of our choices. But of course in terms of software you can just delete it and its provisions no longer affect you.
I don't see what this has to do with anything I've said. The fact that you bring up this seemingly irrelevant example, makes me feel liek you aen;t understanding what I am saying.
Then perhaps you need ot review what you wrote. A person has the right to choose to limit their own freedoms in certain circumstances, you can't take that away.
Denying a person the freedom to shoot themselves in the foot may help to preserve other freedoms that person may have (e.g. freedom to walk), but it is nonetheless a restriction on that persons freedom.
Right, that's my point. It sounds like we agree then!
You forgot the best part: "I know that I can't have babies! But I must have the right to have a baby!"
In French, there is the famous"Permis de conduire un orchestre"...
The issue comes in defining speech. It's not contradictory to put limits when defining a term. Language is broad and the same word or phrase can mean different things to different people. Freedom of Speech refers to expressing ideas - political, religious, philosophical and not being punished by government for saying it. Government cannot prevent you, nor punish you for expressing your ideas even if these ideas are
hateful: Examples include overt racist speech (blacks | white| asians) are X
or wrong: Example: the earth sits on a tortoise; the earth has 4 corners; the earth was created 6000 years ago.
or inciteful and twisting facts: Example: Muhammad was a pedophile
Freedom of Speech does not, and never has, applied to saying untruths about a specific individual (slander). That is outside the scope of the definition of Freedom of Speech.
If you're scared of your govt then you need to further restrict its powers
Vote 3rd Party in 2016 and beyond
Ah, but which user? The GPL was inspired by a printer driver Stallman couldn't rewrite, so he was the user. Microsoft adopted the BSD TCP/IP stack, which I think was probably a Very Good Thing, so Microsoft was the user there. It probably would not have mattered if Stallman's driver had been BSDed, he wanted the source code. Microsoft could not have used a GPLed stack.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
Everything you've just said is irrelevant to the singular point I am reiterating, which is that for every right that is granted a complimentary right is removed. This is not a claim about any specific laws in any specific countries.
It is certainly common for countries to place their own combination of restrictions on free speech as they see fit. But nearly everyone views these as restrictions on free speech (albeit necessary restrictions). It would be silly to treat the United States version of freedom of speech as the benchmark, and treat all deviations from this benchmark as added restrictions or extraneous rights from the gold standard definition for freedom of speech. Laws can change. In fact the UN has urged members of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights to decriminalize libel.
Freedom of Speech does not, and never has, applied to saying untruths about a specific individual (slander). That is outside the scope of the definition of Freedom of Speech.
Freedom of speech wasn't invented by the United States and it is a concept that transcends US law.
There was probably a time when people said that the constitution did not, and never has applied to slaves, and it was true, until it wasn't. Eventually people recognized that the institution of slavery was incompatible with the morals they wanted to embody. I believe that eventually the same thing will happen (and is starting to happen) with defamation laws.
But all this is besides my point that rights are complimentary. The granting of every right is the rejection of it's counterpart. Sometimes it is clear which rights we want (e.g. the right to life vs. the right to murder), but sometimes it isn't so clear (e.g. the right to free speech vs. right to not be slandered). This is a perfectly legitimate and widely accepted rights model.
The concept right is something that you have qua living. It's not anything given to you - but it is something that can be infringed on or taken away. The concept "Right" is an enlightenment term; a term that had little meaning before and has been under attack from the 19th C German Romantic period on. It's a term that can only exist within the context of individual freedom and living in a state where one is a citizen (as opposed to a subject); where government is limited by a matter of law as well as culture.
I would argue that the Freedom of Speech did NOT exist in 15th C Europe; or China; or Japan or in the Muslim world. In fact the very concept of it where by a human being could speak their mind and the government COULD NOT (by law) interfere would have been considered foolishness beyond the realm of conversation. You might as well have been talking about flying and breathing under water.
While Freedom of Speech was not invented by Americans it is a relatively new phenomenom. And we see very clearly the anti-enlightment philosophies that unite in opposition to it; we also see these same philosophies appropriating enlightment terms (rights, liberal) and attaching new meanings to them. Examples include the concept of positive rights and civil rights.
What rights may I ask do you have that comes from being part of a group that you don't have as an individual? Racists may have denied individual rights to "others" but they did not create rights for themselves. If you are outraged by this - think about what you're outraged about. Reflect that what happened was the negation of rights for some; not the creation of rights for the privileged.
A key test to what is and what is not a right is by looking at where "it comes from." You have the right to speech (nobody gives you the thought or the impulse to promote that view) as opposed to the right to healthcare (in which others must provide it for you - even against their will). It you are promoting the later than you are part of the anti-enlightenment; anti-freedom; anti-liberal crowd who has appropriated sanctified terms in order to bolster the value of their positions.
The right to life is not in opposition to the right to murder. There has never been a right to murder another. Think about the definition of rights - the enlightment definition of rights to get this. (There is a right to self-defense though; and for good reason.)
If you're scared of your govt then you need to further restrict its powers
Vote 3rd Party in 2016 and beyond
I think you have a very narrow personal definition of what a right is, and that is limiting your ability to have a conversation that doesn't fall within your strict definition.
The right to life is not in opposition to the right to murder. There has never been a right to murder another.
The right to murder has certainly existed for various individuals throughout history. They were allowed to kill people as they saw fit according to the laws of their lands. You might argue that while their laws allowed them to murder, they still did not have the "right" to murder.
I am quite familiar with the concepts of positive and negative rights, so I really don't need you to keep trying to explain them to me. In fact the concepts of positive and negative rights fits quite well into my model of complimentary rights (i.e. where one is positive and one is negative).
You seem to be someone who is of the opinion that only positive rights are legitimate. Fine. You are free to have that opinion, and you have a lot of company. And in general I agree that positive rights tend to be the better choice when deciding which side of the dichotomy we want. But what you seem to be denying is that the dichotomy even exists.
Where does the right to life come from? I suspect I know what your answer will be, but I'll let you answer for yourself. My answer is that it comes from the government's laws against murder and it's prosecution of crimes that violate these laws. This then becomes a right that requires government action to manifest, blurring the line between positive and negative rights a little.
I don't believe in the abstract concept of self evident rights bestowed by our creator. I find this to be a pretty lazy explanation that creates a convenient yet flawed oversimplification.
Ah, but which user?
Any user. If RMS doesn't want to use a non-free printer then he doesn't have to, if Microsoft doesn't want to use a GPL'd TCP/IP stack because they don't want to release their code then they don't have to. But situations like this where the only difference is the user has to put the bits together because the GPL says somebody else can't do it for them then distribute it to them is just silliness, it doesn't grant any additional freedoms or have any different result except for making it more difficult for the user.
Re: "narrow personal definition of a right" I agree that is narrow, but not that it is personal. :-) Meaning that I hold a concept of rights that is more Enlightment / Individualist rather than Collectivist.
Re right to murder - now we're getting into a matter of semantics that is very difficult to get into in a setting such as this (quick posts as opposed to lengthy conversations or extensive, elaborate explanations. Let it be said that in my "narrow personal definition" of a right I make a distinction between their power to act without consequences to right.
Now source of rights. In the 18th C they used the concept God and Natural Law. I'm an athe!st (a spaghetti-monster sort of athei!t) so the God part is not convincing. What is convincing is the concept that *I* have a right over my own body (not an 18thC idea) as well as my ideas. The government's role in our life is many things - but what it is not is the violator of my rights. Government is there to enforce the social contract - "I promise not to kill you and take your stuff if you promise not to kill me and take mine."
Government did not create my ideas, did not "breathe life into me" (an 18th C phrasing - not mine). It did not give me my rights but it certainly can prevent me from exercising my right: freedom of conscience - called religion back when; freedom of speech, etc...
If you're scared of your govt then you need to further restrict its powers
Vote 3rd Party in 2016 and beyond
Re: "narrow personal definition of a right" I agree that is narrow, but not that it is personal. :-) Meaning that I hold a concept of rights that is more Enlightment / Individualist rather than Collectivist.
By personal, I mean that there is no universally agreed upon model of what rights are and where they are derived and how they should be presented (positive vs. negative or, of complimentary rights, etc).
Re right to murder - now we're getting into a matter of semantics that is very difficult to get into in a setting such as this (quick posts as opposed to lengthy conversations or extensive, elaborate explanations. Let it be said that in my "narrow personal definition" of a right I make a distinction between their power to act without consequences to right.
Exactly. So the right to murder would be the ability to legally murder people (i.e. without legal consequence). This would not stop another private citizen from exercising their right to murder you. Like freedom of speech it only protects you from state consequences of your speech.
What is convincing is the concept that *I* have a right over my own body (not an 18thC idea) as well as my ideas.
To me this doesn't explain anything about where rights come from, anymore than explaining where consciousness comes from by saying "I have a soul because I find the concept that I have a soul convincing".
Government is there to enforce the social contract - "I promise not to kill you and take your stuff if you promise not to kill me and take mine."
I agree. But I also think that it is the enforcement of this contract that causes these rights to manifest. I think we could have chosen a different social contract and different rights would have manifested. I don't think there are any rights that transcend a government's willingness to uphold them. Is there the right to life under the sea? I would say no, because there is no King Triton prosecuting undersea murders.
Government did not create my ideas, did not "breathe life into me" (an 18th C phrasing - not mine). It did not give me my rights but it certainly can prevent me from exercising my right: freedom of conscience - called religion back when; freedom of speech, etc...M
No government did not create the concept of rights. But it is nonetheless where rights come from. If you ask where does a Boeing 737 come from. One answer might be that it came from Boeing engineers and visionaries. Another answer would be that it comes from the Boeing factory, and the raw materials came from wherever they came from. Obviously human beings created the concept of rights. I am saying that governments are rights factories (where rights come from in a literal sense).
We wouldn't have commercial airliners without engineers, we also wouldn't have them without the factories (or facilities where they are actually produced). By the same token, rights would just be an abstract concept without governments to make them a reality.
BTW I accidentally switched positive and negative rights. Everything else I still stand by.
Go fuck yourself, lawyer scum. Your whole profession is an invented need by people who don't want to produce anything, but be parasites in the rest of us.
Interestingly, that seems to be the whole reason the GPL is around in the first place.
To offer something to play with for an anti-social neckbeard and his lawyer friends.
I'm not normally fond of lawyers, but if a lawyer and RMS were both about to drown, I'd take a very long time deciding on which sandwich to eat...
The problem with your analysis is that this:
Since pretty much the beginning, the Linux developers approved, condoned, and encouraged binary, non-GPL modules
Is not even remotely true. Greg KH and Alan Cox have both stated publicly that this is not the case, but more formally the kernel has an explicit set of symbol annotations for things that they consider to be public interfaces (which do not therefore invoke the GPL, because - possibly modulo the recent Oracle ruling - interfaces can not be copyrighted and so being a derived work of something that is not copyrighted can not spread the GPL, and even without this the Linux kernel license contains an explicit exemption for these interfaces). Anything that interacts with code that is not part of these interfaces is a derived work of the kernel and covered by the requirements of the GPL. Given how deeply ZFS must hook into the VM and VFS subsystems to work, it's pretty likely that it requires touching GPL'd parts.
Companies like nVidia sidestep this, because the GPL is a distribution license. They provide a binary blob, most of which is developed as part of a cross-platform effort and so is not a derived work of the kernel. They also distribute a shim. The shim is a derived work of the kernel, and the parts of the blob that talk to the shim could possibly be argued to be derived works of the shim, but the only license that would be violated if they were would be the GPL on the shim, and so the only person with standing to sue nVidia would be nVidia. The fact that they've had to jump through these hoops to do so is evidence that not doing so would not be condoned by the various copyright holders of the kernel. I challenge you to find one example of a binary-only kernel module that is distributed with the awareness and consent of the Linux copyright holders and uses anything other than the interfaces declared public.
The CDDL is a per-file license, so may be linked with code under any license without issues unless those issues come from the other license.
I am not a lawyer, but I've spent enough time with IP lawyers to have had most of these discussions before.
1. Neither Cox nor Hartmann are majority owners of the kernel code.
2. Public statements on community platforms aren't a valid replacement for common legal instruments.
3. Go ahead and check out the ZoL source yourself. You won't find a single "EXPORT_SYMBOL_GPL" in there.
4. The GPL doesn't explicitly state anything about "cross-platform efforts". Judging by the FSF's/GPL's faulty adaption of common law as well as computer science, NVIDIA would be in violation of the GPL as well, since the blob is a part of the kernel in their flawed mindset.