Linus Loves GPL, But Hates GPL Lawsuits (cio.com)

Long-time Slashdot reader sfcrazy writes: During LinuxCon, Torvalds was full of praise for GNU GPL: "The GPL ensures that nobody is ever going to take advantage of your code. It will remain free and nobody can take that away from you. I think that's a big deal for community management... FSF [Free Software Foundation] and I don't have a loving relationship, but I love GPL v2. I really think the license has been one of the defining factors in the success of Linux because it enforced that you have to give back, which meant that the fragmentation has never been something that has been viable from a technical standpoint."

And he thinks the BSD license is bad for everyone: "Over the years, I've become convinced that the BSD license is great for code you don't care about," Torvalds said.
But Linus also addressed the issue of enforcing the GPL on the Linux foundation mailing list when someone proposed a discussion of it at Linuxcon. "I think the whole GPL enforcement issue is absolutely something that should be discussed, but it should be discussed with the working title 'Lawyers: poisonous to openness, poisonous to community, poisonous to projects'... quite apart from the risk of loss in a court, the real risk is something that happens whether you win or lose, and in fact whether you go to court or just threaten: the loss of community, and in particular exactly the kind of community that can (and does) help. You lose your friends."

Comments

We love you, mr. Torvalds

[Anonymous Coward]

If Linus didn't exist, we'd have to invent him.

Re: We love you, mr. Torvalds

[Anonymous Coward]

Trust me dude, there are assholes everywhere.

Re:We love you, mr. Torvalds

[bondsbw]

I have always preferred permissive licenses like MIT and BSD. However, Linus has created the world's most successful open-source software, so perhaps it's worth considering how the license has helped shape the software and its supporting community.

Re:We love you, mr. Torvalds

[0100010001010011]

However part of that was built up over the years prior to the GPLv3, at which point they went out of their way to close a loophole that made Linux popular for certain projects.

If I was building a Tivo today I'd probably start with a BSD license. It's what Sony did with the PlayStation 4.

Re:We love you, mr. Torvalds

[malditaenvidia]

That is not true, Linus didn't create Apache.

Re:We love you, mr. Torvalds

[Linux Torvalds]

Or a close equivalent thereof.

Re:We love you, mr. Torvalds

[Anonymous Coward]

That's mostly a matter of marketing and the willingness to fuck over other open source projects for his own gain. Just read up on what the Linux zealots were doing during USL v. BSD.

Also, I reject the notion that Linux is the world's most successful open-source software. Up until recently BSD code was in basically every computer on the planet due to their networking stack being used by virtually everybody.

There's no reason why the GPL needs to have that heavy handed clause forcing people to license their code via the GPL.

Re:We love you, mr. Torvalds

[Anonymous Coward]

There's no reason why the GPL needs to have that heavy handed clause forcing people to license their code via the GPL.

Yes there is. It allows the project to live long past any one developer's interest in it. If each piece of code was licensed differently, it would be an unmanageable disaster (eg android), especially if the developer chose a closed license. GPLv2 ensures that all code associated with the project remains open source and available to anyone who uses the software.

Re:We love you, mr. Torvalds

[darkain]

That's debatable, considering the amount of BSD source code that has made its way into both open AND closed source projects. For example, the BSD TCP/IP networking stack.

Re:We love you, mr. Torvalds

[Anonymous Coward]

In retrospect, had the GPLv3 been first, the GPL would have stifled Linux development while corporations just pillage the BSD/MIT licensed software for their own use.

The kind of license that needs to exist needs the best of both and the downsides of neither:
- Anyone who adopts this software can not redistribute "their own" incompatible flavor of the software without changing the ABI. (Solves incompatibilities by otherwise identical forks of the same software.) The minimum this requires a web browser to ID itself as "Opera" or "Chrome" not "Mozilla". eg if one software has open(a,b,c) and the new fork has open(a,b,c,d), the new fork must make that open_myfork(a,b,c,d) while still implementing open(a,b,c), if the software removes open(a,b,c) then it can not be called by the same name of the product it was forked from (eg would not be able to have both "Chrome" and "Safari" mentioned)

- Anyone who adopts this software for commercial use must make the complete source code or a patch file against the version indicated in order to ensure the ability to fix bugs in the software or it's libraries in the future. This is especially important for things like OpenSSL and OpenSSH which are used by pretty much all platforms in one shape or another, yet no two OS's or software packages use the same version. This still allows "TiVo"'izing in a limited way without requiring a commercial vendor to open-source everything unrelated to the part they used.

Where I think Linux has failed is in the fragmentation. There are too many "Linux" flavors. They fork and fragment, and no two flavors of linux run the same kernel let alone have a compatible ABI. The end result is it's often worse than Windows on all fronts except "virtualization" servers where the virtualized hardware allows you to strip the kernel down to just virtualized hardware drivers, which makes spinning up a clone of a virtual machine easy and not be impaired by site/seat licenses which Windows has.

Re:We love you, mr. Torvalds

[Anonymous Coward]

If I was building a Tivo today I'd probably start with a BSD license. It's what Sony did with the PlayStation 4.

Having actually seen that done, both with Linux and FreeBSD (as operating systems in routers), I can tell you a) that I would choose Linux every time and that b) the reason is the license and the lawyers.

For the first year or so you will be concentrating on adding features. Making things you probably benefit from keeping private. With Linux you make these in user space which might occasionally make things more difficult. You will eventually want to add some low level functionality and add it to the kernel.

At the point you start low level work, if you used a BSD licensed kernel, there will be a discussion between lawyers and management and likely you end up keeping your functionality private a) because you can and b) because your competition might use it otherwise. If you have a GPL licensed kernel, you will likely decide to publish and push upstream a) because the license pushes you to and b) because even if your competition uses it you will get the benefit back.

After some time, if you don't contribute upstream, you will find that you have incompatibilities with new software versions and you will stick to a stable version. Eventually you will stop benefiting from the evolution of the upstream software. Long term this is a nightmare for the developers. You lose a tiny bit by being "forced" to contribute back. You actually gain a huge amount back from the community because they continue working on your software.

This has happened often; commercial derivatives of BSD operating systems either fork completely or die. 386BSD, JunOS, OSX, IPSO etc. etc. It's very hard to do long term commercial contributions into a complex BSD environment because technically you are giving away shareholder value with no visible recompense.

Re:We love you, mr. Torvalds

[Anonymous Coward]

There's no reason why the GPL needs to have that heavy handed clause forcing people to license their code via the GPL.

Good grief. That's the reason for the GPL's success.

Re:We love you, mr. Torvalds

[Zontar The Mindless]

...no two flavors of linux run the same kernel let alone have a compatible ABI.

But they all have compilers.

Re:We love you, mr. Torvalds

[Anonymous Coward]

Particularly in the embedded space, the history convinced me to change sides. NetBSD should have won decisively in a space where time-to-market beats features or performance, and where companies may badly want to withhold some of their changes to the kernel. In the late 90s, their clean, well-factored code under revision control, their cross-build toolchain, and their portfolio of existing ports delivered this even on top of the license. In practice what happened was, one company after another wrote their own NOR FLASH filesystem and didn't share it. Few companies even admitted they were running NetBSD, even though the BSD license requires the user to give credit. Developers collected consulting fees and celebrated the few small companies they could convince to speak publicly about NetBSD or contribute back code, but very little contributions came from embedded development, and Linux shot ahead of them as companies were compelled to work against their inclination toward their long-term self-interest.

In retrospect, it seems bogglingly stupid that geeks expected MBAs to organize technical society better than they could themselves. These guys burn the fields and move on, and they've always done so.

If it weren't for the BSD story, I would trust Linus's perspective since he has so much experience, and community has always been his specialty. But from what I've seen I think he has stockholm syndrome. These conflicts are fundamental and cannot be shirked.

Re:We love you, mr. Torvalds

[Anonymous Coward]

I wish Linux could understand that you only really love what you will defend.

We know that lesson well in the Marine Corps, and what we love we will defend, even to the point of dying (of course, as a true Marine, you can fight for it longer if you live longer).

If Linus doesn't like defending the GPL, then something is rotten with it. Perhaps not as rotten as something else, but there is a kernel of unpleasantry within its core. I think it has to do with the GPL's language. Most authors seeking to update a GPL project are forced to divest their contributions to the pre-existing project. This leaves small contributors as a permanent serf class feeding the projects.

With MIT and BSD licenses, a contributor can manage his contributions as he likes; however, the contributor must gain popularity within the marketplace or the main line project without his contributions will dominate. There is a small risk that a dominating contribution can push the mainline project into the background, but it cannot erase it, just like the GPL

Personally, I prefer the Apache License. It seems to provide protections to both sides in a spirit of "let's all get along" instead of merely, "it's all mine" or "it's all yours"

   

Re:We love you, mr. Torvalds

[Billly Gates]

If I was building a Tivo today I'd probably start with a BSD license. It's what Sony did with the PlayStation 4.

Having actually seen that done, both with Linux and FreeBSD (as operating systems in routers), I can tell you a) that I would choose Linux every time and that b) the reason is the license and the lawyers.

For the first year or so you will be concentrating on adding features. Making things you probably benefit from keeping private. With Linux you make these in user space which might occasionally make things more difficult. You will eventually want to add some low level functionality and add it to the kernel.

At the point you start low level work, if you used a BSD licensed kernel, there will be a discussion between lawyers and management and likely you end up keeping your functionality private a) because you can and b) because your competition might use it otherwise. If you have a GPL licensed kernel, you will likely decide to publish and push upstream a) because the license pushes you to and b) because even if your competition uses it you will get the benefit back.

After some time, if you don't contribute upstream, you will find that you have incompatibilities with new software versions and you will stick to a stable version. Eventually you will stop benefiting from the evolution of the upstream software. Long term this is a nightmare for the developers. You lose a tiny bit by being "forced" to contribute back. You actually gain a huge amount back from the community because they continue working on your software.

This has happened often; commercial derivatives of BSD operating systems either fork completely or die. 386BSD, JunOS, OSX, IPSO etc. etc. It's very hard to do long term commercial contributions into a complex BSD environment because technically you are giving away shareholder value with no visible recompense.

Um yeah a competitor won't use it? bahaha. They rip off Linux code all the time which is why the point of lawyers are brought up. Shoot some companies like banks have ANTI GNU policies to protect themselves. Linux can not be used as a simple link to GPL infects the whole program making it viral. Look it up? I am not a troll here. PRoblem is most GNU geeks do not know the difference between GPL and LGPL and assume anyone can use their API. It is not true and it pisses me off.

Sorry the BSD/MIT license is the only free one that is business friendly. One is ideal the other is based on reality. Unless you have big pockets you can not guarantee someone won't steal your work.

Now add in licensing agreements and contracts with vendors and customers and it is a can of worms. Look at Java before Oracle bought it? Xerox were assholes and prevented AWT and SWING to be GPL. IcedTea had missing functionality for years.

Under a BSD/MIT license I can write code and do not have to share it. Investors agree and so the lawyers that this is the best option

Re:We love you, mr. Torvalds

[swillden]

Um yeah a competitor won't use it? bahaha. They rip off Linux code all the time which is why the point of lawyers are brought up.

Actually, given the vast usage of Linux worldwide, it's astonishing how rare such abuses are.

Shoot some companies like banks have ANTI GNU policies to protect themselves.

Some companies are still clueless enough to do that, yes.

Linux can not be used as a simple link to GPL infects the whole program making it viral.

Poppycock. Programs running on Linux do not link to Linux. It's well-accepted that the GPL does not affect programs that merely make syscalls.

I am not a troll here.

Interesting that you feel the need to make that statement.

GNU geeks do not know the difference between GPL and LGPL and assume anyone can use their API. It is not true and it pisses me off.

Also nonsense. Most F/LOSS software developers understand perfectly the distinction between GPL and LGPL, and choose appropriately based on whether they want to allow their code to be linked to non-GPL code. Personally, I've used both licenses for libraries I wrote. Though for programs I tend to choose GPL and for libraries I tend to choose Apache2 or BSD. I think the use case for LGPL is pretty narrow.

Investors agree and so the lawyers that [BSD] is the best option

Only if your lawyers haven't bothered to think about patents. The BSD license has a severe flaw in that it doesn't include a patent grant. If you're incorporating someone else's code into your product and you aren't absolutely certain they don't hold any patents on it, you may be setting yourself up for a patent lawsuit. Apache2 is often a better choice for that reason.

Re:We love you, mr. Torvalds

[Anonymous Coward]

At the point you start low level work, if you used a BSD licensed kernel, there will be a discussion between lawyers and management and likely you end up keeping your functionality private

I am management, and I don't have to do what my lawyers advise.

I build products based on FreeBSD, and we contribute patches back, and make donations to the FreeBSD Foundation.

It's very hard to do long term commercial contributions into a complex BSD environment because technically you are giving away shareholder value with no visible recompense.

Not all companies are public. As the CTO and minority shareholder of my company, I am only answerable to my customers and my business partnet who is CEO and majority shareholder. We contribute back to FreeBSD and other projects because there is no value in maintaining a private fork, and considerable costs. On the other hand we sometimes keep our application specific components closed, and sometimes release them under the ISC permissive license, depending on the business case for it.

From my view, competitors are a good thing, especially if they "steal" our permissive licensed code. Anything they come up with is much easier to legally duplicate if it's based on our work, than duplicating it from scratch. Unless they have a patent on it, we are legally in the clear to look at what they've done and do it again in-house, usually better, because we have their mistakes to use as a guide star.

A modest proposal: an alternative to court battles

[Anonymous Coward]

In the past, matters of honor were settled with duels to the death. Maybe we should start taking slapping the faces of CEOs of GPL-violating companies with gloves.

Oh yawn...

[QuietLagoon]

he thinks the BSD license is bad for everyone:

I happen to like using the BSD license for my code.

.
I wrote the code, so what right does Torvalds have in telling me what to do with my code?

Re:Oh yawn...

[mspohr]

You can do whatever you want with your code. Linus just thinks that the BSD license is only good for code you don't care about... but, dude, that's, like, just his opinion, man.

Re:Oh yawn...

[QuietLagoon]

... Linus just thinks that the BSD license is only good for code you don't care about... but, dude, that's, like, just his opinion, man....

Yup, it's his [incorrect] opinion of how I think about my code. :)

Re: Oh yawn...

[Anonymous Coward]

He didn't tell you what to do with it, he just said bsd licenses are bad, and you must not care about your code. It's just that he has a bully pulpit you and I don't have, and when he talks out his ass, people believe him.

Re:Oh yawn...

[Anonymous Coward]

In no way is it any statement of what he think's of your code. You're being overly narcissistic here.

Re:Oh yawn...

[OrangeTide]

I think if you want to build an empire around your projects, that BSD is probably not the best way to go. It's too easy for anyone to setup a business and overshadow your contributions. (it's why the wine project switch to GPL)

I tend to use ISC, MIT, or BSD myself. But I'm not looking to be the be in charge of the next Linux, GIMP, GTK, etc.

Re:Oh yawn...

[Anonymous Coward]

"Yup, it's his [incorrect] opinion of how I think about my code. :)"

His opinion is really how he looks at BSD and what it's good for (to him). It has nothing to do with what you think of your code.

Re:Oh yawn...

[Anonymous Coward]

BSD is 'hey look I made some cool code do what you like with it just say I had a hand in it, somewhere. Share it, or dont, not my problem.'

GPL is 'hey look I made some cool code do what you like with it. You must share what you did with others just as I did with you.'

Re:Oh yawn...

[NotInHere]

Each open source license has its goals and principles, and none is "bad" or "evil" from itself.

Re:Oh yawn...

[Anonymous Coward]

That's certainly fair. I do find it funny when code from the BSD OS's is adopted by GNU/Linux programmers. The BSD people complain that the GPL people do not contribute back their code because it is GPL, yet when companies adopt the code and keep all code proprietary, it is okay. As long as you are fine with either situation, your opinion is worth respect. If you think it's okay to take code proprietary, but not GPL, you must have one screwed up philosophy.

Re:Oh yawn...

[segedunum]

Yup, it's his [incorrect] opinion of how I think about my code. :)

ROTFL. That's your opinion.

Re:Oh yawn...

[Anonymous Coward]

It's his [incorrect] opinion, even.

Re:Oh yawn...

[Anonymous Coward]

Except that the BSD (and MIT for that matter) allow other companies to take your code and then sue you for it.

Re:Oh yawn...

[murdocj]

How does that "sue you for it" work?

Re:Oh yawn...

[AmiMoJo]

How do you get from "I think this is bad" to "stop telling me what to do"?

Re:Oh yawn...

[QuietLagoon]

ROTFL. That's your opinion.

On the contrary, it's a fact. You see, I know exactly how I think about my code, Torvalds hasn't a clue. So if he says I prefer BSD license because I don't care about my code, he is expressing his opinion. I can definitely say his opinion is wrong because I know what I think about my code.

.
But have fun!

btw, I've noticed a change in the GPL busy-bodies' approach to evangelism. It used to be "set your code free with GPL" or some such. I could never understand how my code could be more free with more restrictions placed upon how it can be used.

Now I'm noticing the change to more of a "your code isn't good enough to be GPL-licensed" style of approach.

I never understood why the GPL busy bodies were so concerned with what i did with the code i write. :)

Re:Oh yawn...

[OrangeTide]

Citation please?

Re:Oh yawn...

[mark-t]

I wrote the code, so what right does Torvalds have in telling me what to do with my code?

If you actually wrote it entirely yourself, none. If it's a derivative work, however, Torvalds has the same rights as any copyright holder would over derivative works from their stuff... you need the original copyright holder's permission first. The GPL really only outlines what the requirements are to *get* such permission so that no other explicit written permission is necessary, which is what would typically be otherwise required to independently create a derivative work of somone else's copyrighted stuff.

Re:Oh yawn...

[mark-t]

I never understood why the GPL busy bodies were so concerned with what i did with the code i write. :)

They aren't. They are concerned about derivative works of THEIR OWN code, concerns that they are legally entitled to have by virtue of having the copyright on the code that they wrote. The fact that a derivative work might have your own code in it is entirely superfluous, if it is a derivative work then you still need the original copyright holder's permission to do something with it. The GPL outlines the terms necessary to receive such permission. Nothing more, and nothing less.

Re:Oh yawn...

[LostMyBeaver]

I don't understand... did he say anything about your code and what you should do with it? You must be really awesome at interpreting work orders.

Re:Oh yawn...

[The Evil Atheist]

So if he says I prefer BSD license because I don't care about my code

You have a big problem with comprehension. He's not saying it's THE reason why YOU prefer it. He's saying it's a good match IF you don't care what others do with the code. He's talking about what the licence is good for, not about the people who use it.

Re:Oh yawn...

[Anonymous Coward]

he thinks the BSD license is bad for everyone:

I happen to like using the BSD license for my code.

.

I wrote the code, so what right does Torvalds have in telling me what to do with my code?

He didn't tell you what to do with your code. Perhaps read what was actually SAID, and not what you THINK was said. He didn't say, "DON'T USE BSD licensing," he simply gave his opinion on the license. His opinion doesn't have the power to DAMAGE the license. In point of fact, there is no reason you can't release whatever shit you wrote under that license, even if it didn't exist.

You could write it yourself. It's like he said, "I don't give my kids ice cream before bed," and you responding, "who is Linus to tell me how to raise MY KIDS?!?"

He didn't. He just stated HIS position. This is a topic for discussion because he wrote something that is used around the world, by millions, or even BILLIONS of people...

What the fuck did YOU write? More importantly, who the fuck cares?

In short, go BSD license yourself. If you want. See what I did there?

Re:Oh yawn...

[Anonymous Coward]

It's fairly unusual for companies to bother to keep their own forks as that's expensive and a huge pain in the backside to keep patched up. Most of the time they contribute as much as they can back into the project they're borrowing code from so as to reduce the likelihood of their patches not applying properly. Apple is a good example, they contribute back most of what they do for the OS, it's mainly the UI elements that they keep to themselves.

Also, re-licensing BSD code as GPL code is a pretty blatant violation of the licensing terms. It's literally one of the only things you can do that actually violates the BSD license.

Re:Oh yawn...

[Anonymous Coward]

That's a load of crap. BSD licensing does not imply that people think less of their code, this is just more of the ignorance that comes from the FSF and Linux folks.

BSD licensing is for people who actually want to give software away for free without attaching non-free strings to it. I'm sure in the early '90s when the GPL was created, it was a sensible assumption that if you didn't force companies to give back that they wouldn't, but reality hasn't followed that assumption. It's just too costly and too inconvenient to maintain your own fork just for the purposes of keeping the code secret. Which is why companies have a tendency to keep the smallest amount of code secret that they can when using BSD licensed code.

Re:Oh yawn...

[The Evil Atheist]

It's more of a theoretical concern than a real one, but there are some possibilities.

Their source is closed and yours is open. They make changes and you make changes. You can't see their changes, but they can definitely see your changes. If they may a certain change first, and they see you make a subsequent change that looks remarkably similar to their changes, they can take you to court for possibly stealing their code.

And before you come back saying "oh, but that will never fly in court" - you would be forgetting that, especially in the US system, it doesn't need to. They just need to make the claim and if you're a small time developer, you cannot afford the legal fees, so you settle.

So far, that hasn't happened. Although out of court settlements often forbid you from talking about it, so maybe we just can't hear about it happening.

Re:Oh yawn...

[murdocj]

It sounds very, VERY theoretical. Particularly since they'd have to show that YOU had access to THEIR work. Not to mention why are they bothering to track the people whose work they are using in order to sue them? It's a bit like saying that every 60 million years a killer asteroid shows up, so we better spend our days looking up at the sky, just in case. There are more worthwhile things to worry about.

Re:Oh yawn...

[Anonymous Coward]

Not right:

This -> GPL is 'hey look I made some cool code do what you like with it. You must share what you did with others just as I did with you.'
Is -> GPL is 'hey look I made some cool code do what you like with it. You must share what you did with others just as I did with you. And if some of your other code touches mine, you should open also'.

That's because commercial companies always try to avoid the GPL virus.

Re:Oh yawn...

[epyT-R]

License it how you like. If you want it included in the kernel, you'll have to license that submission with GPLv2. As the copyright remains with you, you can choose to multilicense it as much as you like.

Re:Oh yawn...

[mark-t]

BSD licensing does not imply that people think less of their code

Actually, it only directly implies that people who use BSD licensing think less about derivative works from their code than people who use the GPL. This is perfectly fine, but since derivative works would typically contain substantial portions of the original code, by extension, the lack of care about derivative works of their ccde thereby reduces to a lack of care about their own code, from that perspective.

Re:Oh yawn...

[Anonymous Coward]

if it is a derivative work then you still need the original copyright holder's permission to do something with it. The GPL outlines the terms necessary to receive such permission. Nothing more, and nothing less.

It's not quite an issue with an apostrophe changing the legal meaning, but I think your statement is more valid if you change "something" to "some things". There are plenty of things you can do with works derived from GPL'd works that don't require the original copyright holder's permission. For instance, you could run it on one, or a million privately owned computers, and never distribute the modifications to anybody, ever. That is definitely 'something' and 100% legal. Now what you can't do, is distribute it to others, without the source changes as well. But there are definitely plenty of things you can do.

Re:Oh yawn...

[The Evil Atheist]

People DO spend their days looking up at the sky just in case.

You missed the point about the American system. They can have the flimsiest of cases but they can still threaten to bankrupt you without trying to win.

Re:Oh yawn...

[dbIII]

He is talking about code connected with his project. As far as yours goes all he is saying is "it worked for me" - he's not telling you to do anything one way or another.

Re:Oh yawn...

[dbIII]

It sort of was theoretical until Darl McBride and his lawyer brother decided to use that premise to funnel as much money out of SCO as they could by pretending that code from linux was stolen from SCO and that IBM was financially responsible. Of course they lost, destroying SCO completely, but the legal fees were spectacular leaving them very wealthy perpetrators of a two man scam.

Re:Oh yawn...

[tlhIngan]

Their source is closed and yours is open. They make changes and you make changes. You can't see their changes, but they can definitely see your changes. If they may a certain change first, and they see you make a subsequent change that looks remarkably similar to their changes, they can take you to court for possibly stealing their code.

"Their source is closed". Let's change it to "Their source is incompatible with BSD".

Because you know what? "Open Source GPL" is just as guilty of "closing off" BSD code as closed-source is.

It's just everyone who's a fan of the GPL doesn't want you know about it. Even RMS always digs at BSD as "close source theft! closed source theft!" without a thought that "open source GPL lockout!" applies just as well in digs at BSD code. So yes, GPL "openness" can be just as guilty of "locking up" BSD code as a company like Microsoft or Apple can. But you'll never hear a GPL fanboy admit that, because the whole "evilness" of BSD is locking up, and that only happens in the closed source world, right? Of course, it also ruins the whole "open source" and "free source" concept when the very license that is supposed to provide it (GPL), exploits the very thing it's against (locking up source code).

In short,anyone claiming BSD sucks over GPL because of locking up code is a hypocrite, because GPL locks up BSD code just as well as closed-source licenses do.

As for GPL enforcement, well, it's the same as when a company enforces copyright on someone who downloaded songs, movies, TV, or software. You can't really be "for" GPL enforcement and "against" movie/music/tv/software copyright enforcement, because they're actually one and the same. You can't enforce the GPL without copyright, and you can't really be for prosecuting GPL offenders without having all other IP vendors (and groups like the RIAA and MPAA) also prosecuting copyright offenses. Perhaps that's why Linus hates GPL enforcement, because put another way, it's like the music/movie/software industry suing people as well. It's the same concept - if you don't accept the GPL, you accept default all rights reserved copyright, so a GPL violation is a copyright violation, or piracy. But so is download music you don't own, movies you don't own, software (non-free) you don't own, etc.

Re:Oh yawn...

[The Evil Atheist]

"Their source is closed". Let's change it to "Their source is incompatible with BSD". Because you know what? "Open Source GPL" is just as guilty of "closing off" BSD code as closed-source is.

What utter nonsense. Think about the scenario I outlined for a second. If they (the GPLd project) sees that you've made a change to your BSDd code that looks like theirs... that means they already HAVE YOUR CODE. Why would they then "sue" for copyright infringement when, for all intents and purposes, they were able to get their code back, from their point of view?

In short,anyone claiming BSD sucks over GPL because of locking up code is a hypocrite, because GPL locks up BSD code just as well as closed-source licenses do.

How does GPL lock up the code when you can ACQUIRE THE CODE? The point of GPL over closed source is that you can't SEE the closed source. Don't equivocate between the two when there are CLEAR differences.

Perhaps that's why Linus hates GPL enforcement

Or how about reading what he actually wrote and not just the loaded Slashdot summary of the article, which in itself is an incomplete summary of what he said in the mailing list?

Re:Oh yawn...

[Dagger2]

btw, I've noticed a change in the GPL busy-bodies' approach to evangelism. It used to be "set your code free with GPL" or some such. I could never understand how my code could be more free with more restrictions placed upon how it can be used.

The only extra restriction the GPL has over BSD is "you can't add more restrictions to this code". Saying BSD is more free than GPL is a bit like saying anarchy is more free than democracy because you can imprison/enslave whoever you like. In practice you end up being less free with anarchy.

Now I'm noticing the change to more of a "your code isn't good enough to be GPL-licensed" style of approach.

Well I have no idea what that's about. There's no minimum quality bar for GPLed code; go for it.

I never understood why the GPL busy bodies were so concerned with what i did with the code i write. :)

Because it affects everyone, or perhaps more to the point it affects them a lot more than it affects you (because you can always do whatever you like with your own code).

Ultimately it's your call, of course. It would just be nice if your call contributed to the network effects of open-and-will-stay-open code.

Re:Oh yawn...

[Ol Olsoc]

So if he says I prefer BSD license because I don't care about my code

You have a big problem with comprehension. He's not saying it's THE reason why YOU prefer it. He's saying it's a good match IF you don't care what others do with the code. He's talking about what the licence is good for, not about the people who use it.

No, really. I was talking to Linus just the other day over latte's and scones, (such an eclectic fellow our lad is) and he was telling me, "There's this fucking programmer that goes by QuietLagoon, and I can't stand that damned idiot. Always fucking disagreeing with me, and piss on that" (oh, our salty tongued lad, that Linus is)

But he closed with saying "I know this fucking QuietLagoon and his ways. I'll be watching that bastard, because this is personal between me and the him."

Re:Oh yawn...

[myrrdyn]

He's not telling you what to do with your code. From the same interview:

"Some people love the BSD license. Some people love the proprietary licenses. I understand that. If you want to make a program and you want to feed your kids, it makes a lot of sense to have a proprietary license and sell binaries. I think it makes less sense today, but I really understand the argument. I don't want to judge. I'm just giving my view on licensing."

Re:Oh yawn...

[Anonymous Coward]

People DO spend their days looking up at the sky just in case.

You missed the point about the American system. They can have the flimsiest of cases but they can still threaten to bankrupt you without trying to win.

A lawsuit filed in East Texas is 99.9% likely to be decided in favour of the plaintiff.

Re:Oh yawn...

[Bengie]

Apple contributes back to BSD more than GPL does. GPL is worse than the thiefs they claim to protect against.

Re:Oh yawn...

[mark-t]

Fair observation. In addition to the cases that you noted, there is also the concept of fair use, which because it does not require explicit permission from the copyright holder, it would not require you to agree to abide by the terms of the GPL either... as long as fair use can be deemed applicable. There are probably other cases too that I can't think of right off the top of my head, but these are typically exceptions to copyright and not the general rule. As such, it would probably have been more correct for me to have written

if it is a derivative work then you generally still need the original copyright holder's permission to do something with it

But Slashdot doesn't let people edit their posts after they hit submit.

Otherwise... yes, it's a valid criticism of how I phrased it in my original post. I do not believe that it deflates the point I was making, however.

Re: Oh yawn...

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow, you haven't stated one thing that counters his arguments. All I hear is opinions going on over here. No facts =

Re:Oh yawn...

[OrangeTide]

How does GPL lock up the code when you can ACQUIRE THE CODE? The point of GPL over closed source is that you can't SEE the closed source. Don't equivocate between the two when there are CLEAR differences.

A BSD project can be turned into a GPL project. I think that is what is meant by "lock up". It's more an issue that you can lock up the license, but not the code, with GPL. With BSD/MIT, anyone with a copy has some flexibility in stacking other licenses on top of the extremely permissive license. That's a flexibility that GPL lacks (and intentionally).

Re:A modest proposal: an alternative to court batt

[Anonymous Coward]

Put them in stocks in the public square, and throw rotten fruit at them.

I like GPLv2 too, but there's just one thing

[Sax Russell 5449D29A]

How does GPLv2 fit the web server world? Imagine you have a JS library licensed under GPLv2; what will be the implications of using such for the rest of the site's code? I imagine I could use my own GPLv2'd code without much concern, but if anyone else used it, they'd, in principle, have to open up their whole code base after that.

Or that might not be the case. But then again that *is* the problem as nobody really knows how it works in normal circumstances. Going with BSD is simple because it's a very, very easy license to understand. You just slap it on your code and it can be used in pretty much any way anybody wants without giving it too much thought. Just mention the original author(s) somewhere in your application and everything's fine.

Re:I like GPLv2 too, but there's just one thing

[NotInHere]

Most js libraries were made to help people develop proprietary JS solutions. The GPL is simply nothing their creators would want for them. Similar to game engines, here people want to use them to develop proprietary games with. Non copyleft licenses are good for these use cases. But in other domains, like the kernel or for compilers, copyleft makes just far more sense, otherwise you'll start accumulating proprietary tiny bits and pieces.

Re:I like GPLv2 too, but there's just one thing

[lcall]

The BSD licenses and the Apache license are simpler but they fail to prevent someone from taking your hard work, making improvements (or incorporating it into their own product), releasing that, and you can't necessarily benefit from their improvements, and they sell your code back to you, which you provided freely. So one factor is whether that matters to you. The GPL and AGPL have been debated thoroughly. Wikipedia has quick overviews of them, in case one find that helpful.

Re:I like GPLv2 too, but there's just one thing

[lcall]

The GPL doesn't require opening the code if it is just running on a server that someone accesses. The AGPL (or "Affero GPL") was created to fill that gap: it requires making source code available to users for web apps, for example.

Re:I like GPLv2 too, but there's just one thing

[Anonymous Coward]

If you want the server to be open source but don't care about the client, GPL allows that. For example, MySQL is licensed under GPL. The clients don't have to be (MariaDB has LGPL connectors that allow close-sourcing of the client applications). Amazon uses MySQL's GPL code to close-source Aurora because the database server is not distributed per-say, only the service. This is the SaaS loop-hole of the GPL. The result is a smaller % of the pie for MySQL but a larger pie for everybody, including MySQL.

If you don't like this approach or don't think it's fair, there is AGPL that covers the SaaS scenario. In this case everything must be open source. That's the license chosen by MongoDB.

As a contributor, GPL and AGPL are great if your personal goal is to ensure that the code remains open source (AGPL more so) for the end user.

BSD is the license of choice for close-sourcers. As you said, just take the code and put the contributor's name in a low-profile file somewhere.

As a contributor, BSD is great if your personal goal is to have your code used and embedded by others with you being credited for the contribution.

As an open-source software developer or integrator, GPL, AGPL and BSD are all great. As a closed-source software developer or integrator clearly BSD only, unless in the case of a SaaS, for which the GPL SaaS loophole allows close sourcing.

In the case of Linus, he seems to prefer the eco-system enabled by the GPL license and, besides, his ego is already taken care of with the project named after him.

Re:I like GPLv2 too, but there's just one thing

[jedidiah]

There is no reason you can't make proprietary games based off of (l)GPL code. No games or commercial applications (like Oracle) would exist otherwise. The license of a game engine is completely immaterial.

Except for RMS, no one uses the strict form of GPL for shared libraries and such.

Re:I like GPLv2 too, but there's just one thing

[93 Escort Wagon]

I Found it notable Linus felt it important to indicate which version of the GPL met with his approval.

Re:I like GPLv2 too, but there's just one thing

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd think you could do LGPL for an engine, since that would keep engine mods open, while allowing games to be closed.

Re:I like GPLv2 too, but there's just one thing

[Gavagai80]

Except for RMS, no one uses the strict form of GPL for shared libraries and such.

Businesses occasionally use GPL for a library for which they require copyright assignment of any contributions, so that they can use the GPL tactically as a way to encourage their clients to pay them to dual-license the library for commercial use.

Re:I like GPLv2 too, but there's just one thing

[i.r.id10t]

Well, unless you are giving out binaries of your code then you don't need to worry. GPLv2 doesn't care about who receives the output of the code, just if you distribute the code or a binary compiled from that code.

GPL3

Affero GPL licensed stuff though, if you run a server with it and I get the output, I can ask for the code.

Re:I like GPLv2 too, but there's just one thing

[jrumney]

There is something ironic about getting upset about being forced to open your JavaScript source code for anyone who has access to your website to download and copy.

Re:I like GPLv2 too, but there's just one thing

[Bengie]

If they make changes, it's no longer my code. I don't see the issue. This is the way I see it
GPL: Forcing riff-raff to contribute back
BSD: Make the world a better place by sharing

The only good code is code given willingly. GPL is made by forced labor in North Korean sweat shops and BSD is made by freedom loving hippies.

Re:I like GPLv2 too, but there's just one thing

[mark-t]

If they make changes to your copyrighted content, then while the new product isn't entirely your code anymore, it is still considered a derivative work of your code. One needs permission from the copyright holder to make derivative works of copyrighted content, and the GPL simply states what terms a person has to agree to in order to receive such permission, saving the recipient who may be interested in creating such a derivative work from having to hunt down the copyright holder and seek express written permission that they would otherwise have to obtain to legally have any ability to create and publish such derivative works.

Re:I like GPLv2 too, but there's just one thing

[Anonymous Coward]

Since when is javascript code worth protecting from anything? 99% of the usecase is just spamming ads at people.

Re:I like GPLv2 too, but there's just one thing

[Sax Russell 5449D29A]

It's not that. I want to open up my code base and let people use it, even commercially. I just want them to release any changes they make to the code I've worked on, not any other code that's unrelated to the code I've worked on. How this works with web servers is far from clear when it comes to using GPLv2 and GPLv3.

You know, people can't really go and grab someone's code and use it without caring for how it's licensed. I want to provide all of my code under a proper license so that people can freely use it, but choosing the right license is a difficult.

Re:I like GPLv2 too, but there's just one thing

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm not expert on american legal system, but why would the permission need to be written down? Don't you have concept of verbal agreement?

Re:I like GPLv2 too, but there's just one thing

[jrumney]

LGPL would seem to be made for what you are looking for.

Re:I like GPLv2 too, but there's just one thing

[Anonymous Coward]

How does GPLv2 fit the web server world? Imagine you have a JS library licensed under GPLv2; what will be the implications of using such for the rest of the site's code? I imagine I could use my own GPLv2'd code without much concern, but if anyone else used it, they'd, in principle, have to open up their whole code base after that.

Or that might not be the case. But then again that *is* the problem as nobody really knows how it works in normal circumstances. Going with BSD is simple because it's a very, very easy license to understand. You just slap it on your code and it can be used in pretty much any way anybody wants without giving it too much thought. Just mention the original author(s) somewhere in your application and everything's fine.

Hence the GNU GPL Version 3 License which some project have adopted. The Linux kernel remains under GNU GPL Version 2 licensing thereby preventing misappropriation of source code. The question comes down to "is software-as-a-service (SaaS) considered distribution if a user accesses the service?" I am not a lawyer.

Re:I like GPLv2 too, but there's just one thing

[mark-t]

Look at almost any copyright notice in any non-free work and you'd see what I mean about the notion of written permission. Published works are copyrighted by default in NA, and so a certain level of accountability is generally required to confirm authorization to copy the work. Thus, it tends to be the default that written permission is the default requirement for getting permission to copy someone else's copyrighted work. If verbal permission, or some other arrangement were actually all that were required, the copyright notice itself would generally explicitly say so.... Even on free works, such as GPL, BSD, MIT, etc, the copyright license itself essentially constitutes written permission to copy the work freely.

Re:I like GPLv2 too, but there's just one thing

[Anonymous Coward]

That's quite a bit of weaseling: "tend to", "default" and examples of what is being usually done instead of spelling out what is actually required and by what scripture. Supposing I indeed do have the permission and trust the author, is there a legal requirement for me to get it on paper or not? Obviously the author is not going to sue me because that would be dishonest but can anyone else do so?

Re:I like GPLv2 too, but there's just one thing

[Billly Gates]

The problem is just that. Geeks do not know the difference between LGPL and GPL. Yes you can not link under GPL without your program being GPL. Go read the license? The game is in violation of the GPL which I assume was RMS point to get rid of proprietary software.

Most think they can write an api and GPL and it can be used for all. Not true.

Re:I like GPLv2 too, but there's just one thing

[mark-t]

is there a legal requirement for me to get it on paper or not?

No, there is not.

Obviously the author is not going to sue me because that would be dishonest but can anyone else do so?

Potentially...if someone else has legitimate interest, such as what might happen if the copyright holder happens to be represented by an aggressively litigious agency that has no written records of any permission being given, or if copyright ownership was transferred to someone else since permission was acquired. While perhaps this might turn out favorably if you can contact the person who granted permission, it is very possible that they may no longer even be reachable when a lawsuit happens, possibly even deceased, so you would not be able to get them to attest to any verbal consent having ever been given at a time when you need it most. Written permission from the original copyright holder might be required in such circumstances to prove to another party that you were actually given legitimate permission by an authorized party to copy the work.

Re:I like GPLv2 too, but there's just one thing

[Anonymous Coward]

In the American legal system, verbal agreements aren't worth the paper they're written on.

Re:I like GPLv2 too, but there's just one thing

[Anonymous Coward]

What about the loss of money? It all turned less than profitable.

The problem with GPL

[Anonymous Coward]

...is that it doesn't really care about freedom. You can't have freedom if there's a "but only if..." attached to it, which is the whole premise of GPL. It puts all the trust in the world to the end-user of software (the freedom to always get software for free), but no trust at all in the developers of software (no freedom to use or incorporate the software unless you submit to the GPL and turn all of your own work into the same). GPL happily slurps up almost all other licenses, but through its stubborn nature it itself does not give anything back. The amount of software "taken" from BSD into GPL is vast, but the opposite is so thin you can get a paper cut from it. "Of course you get software back, but only if you think, say and act like GPL wants you to" isn't what freedom is about.

Re:The problem with GPL

[OrangeTide]

I was always confused by the freedom position that GPL has. I get freedom by having more restrictions?

Seems a bit Orwellian to me. Freedom is Slavery, War is Peace, Ignorance is Strength.

Re:The problem with GPL

[NotInHere]

The only restriction the GPL imposes is to prevent you to take away freedom. Thus, the GPL is only "non-free" to those who want to restrict or remove freedom.

Well there is one exception of course, its compatibility with other copyleft licenses. See the whole ZFS license debacle. But that's a negative side effect, and not what the GPL was designed for (however precisely what the CDDL was designed for, but thats a different story).

Re:The problem with GPL

[Anonymous Coward]

The rest of us get more freedom by restricting your freedom.
The needs of the many...etc, etc,etc

Re:The problem with GPL

[gerddie]

[...] You can't have freedom if there's a "but only if..." attached to it, [...]

I'm free to swing my fist, but only if I don't hit you.

Now, based on this example, please explain again what kind of freedom you are looking for that has no "but only if ..." attached to it.

Re:The problem with GPL

[hey!]

Its the freedom to enter a fair agreement: you can use my software as long as you treat others the same way I'm treating you.

Is that as free as "do whatever you want"? No. But it's as free as a fair-minded person needs it to be.

Re:The problem with GPL

[bug1]

The GPL isnt about YOU having freedom, its about the SOFTWARE having freedom despite you.

Re:The problem with GPL

[Anonymous Coward]

I was always confused by the freedom position that GPL has. I get freedom by having more restrictions?

Seems a bit Orwellian to me. Freedom is Slavery, War is Peace, Ignorance is Strength.

You are conflating freedom with choice. Freedom is the responsibility to keep code available for all to use. Choice is a side effect of that freedom. BSD license provides more choice, but less protection of the code being available for all to use. i.e. it has less responsibility. GPL protects user freedom. BSD protects developer freedom. It's really not that hard, but maybe Linus was wrong. We need MORE lawyers.

Re:The problem with GPL

[jedidiah]

No, it just acknowledges the difference between liberty and anarchy.

Law and Order allows you to keep whatever money you make. Otherwise some thug could come along and just take everything you have with no recourse.

People are intentionally obtuse on this point.

Re:The problem with GPL

[Anonymous Coward]

The BSD license allows that. Or didn't you read the BSD license?

Re:The problem with GPL

[Anonymous Coward]

It's the GPL that doesn't allow it.

Re:The problem with GPL

[OrangeTide]

My own freedom is unaffected if someone takes my software, uses it commercially and does not share those modifications with me.

Re:The problem with GPL

[OrangeTide]

wouldn't the code being available to all for any use make BSD more free? But I suppose it's not a competition on who is most free.

Re:The problem with GPL

[OrangeTide]

But I agree, in order to maintain membership of my community, to give up some of what I make to pay property taxes and income taxes. This Law and Order has the same effect, it doesn't allow me to "keep whatever money [I] make". Is it extortion, or a healthy functional civilization, its not always to obvious.

So in the analogy, is BSD license Law and Order and GPL the thug?

Re:The problem with GPL

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry, but your definition of freedom is perverted. Please, look up freedom. Nobody is taking your code away from you if it's still available online and used by everyone. Even after the corporate world used bits and pieces of code from the BSD platform all the original code is still there intact. There is no such thing as copyleft on the law books. There is only Copyright, GPL is Copyright, and content under copyrights dictates(restrictions) to the users what you can and can't do. BSD, MIT, Apache all fall under copyright.

Re:The problem with GPL

[Anonymous Coward]

The only restriction the GPL imposes is to prevent you to take away freedom. Thus, the GPL is only "non-free" to those who want to restrict or remove freedom.

Well there is one exception of course, its compatibility with other copyleft licenses. See the whole ZFS license debacle. But that's a negative side effect, and not what the GPL was designed for (however precisely what the CDDL was designed for, but thats a different story).

Pray tell, how does me taking a piece of GPL software and publishing a modified version without the source "deprive" you of "freedom"? Are you incapable of doing anything that you would be able to do if I did nothing instead?

Re: The problem with GPL

[Anonymous Coward]

But *my* freedom is diminished when you choose the rights of corporations over the rights of citizens. Well that's the way I see it when I choose projects to use or to work with or to contribute to. It's a philosophical thing for me.

Re: The problem with GPL

[Anonymous Coward]

Alice and Bob each make a software thingie. Alice uses the bsd license and is sad when a company takes it, builds upon it, but won't allow her to even see the improvements let alone use it. Bob uses the gpl license and is happy to find that someone improved upon his code and shared the improvements with him. Later, Alice and Bob get in an argument about which license is "freer". Silly Alice and Bob, eh.

Re:The problem with GPL

[The Evil Atheist]

The freedom of the people who receive those modifications is affected. And if those people want features and bug fixes, your freedom to provide it for them is diminished because you don't know if it's your code or the proprietary code that needs to change and how to change it.

It's completely okay to not care about flow on effects, but please admit you're not thinking about the big picture.

Re:The problem with GPL

[Anonymous Coward]

The GPL is about code freedom not people freedom. I consider people more important than code so I reject the license in most cases. I you're pro RMS, and you think code is more important than you are, GPL your code. If you don't give a crap how people use it, but you want credit for the code, BSDL. it's really that simple.

I love that the CDDL and GPL conflict. It means the GPL lovers get a taste of their own medicine. It sucks when you can't use code because someone choose a bad license.

Re:The problem with GPL

[Anonymous Coward]

Yup, and as a result, the BSDs have a lack of features and hardware support because few are giving back to the base projects. BSD license attracts the kind of people who want to fork and only ship changed binaries. This is one of the reasons why linux has flourished and bsd has stayed relatively stagnant.

Re:The problem with GPL

[Anonymous Coward]

unless of course that someone works for your government, integrates your software into a larger system called 'the supermagnificient firewall' and ...

Re:The problem with GPL

[Anonymous Coward]

No, it's not.

Re:The problem with GPL

[Raenex]

Seems a bit Orwellian to me. Freedom is Slavery, War is Peace, Ignorance is Strength.

Yes, it is Orwellian. That's GPL propaganda for you.

Here's real freedom:

You may copy, modify, and distribute as you please. In other words, what the world would look like without copyright.

Here's GPL "freedom":

You must release your source along with your binary.

Now you may agree or not if that's overall good for society, but that's an argument for consumer protection, not "freedom". For example, I may very well like the idea of government food regulations, but regulation is the exact opposite of freedom.

Re: The problem with GPL

[TuringTest]

The GPL is a free licence in the same way that the USA is designed to be a free country: it doesn't remove all impositions from those who use it, but the few impositions that it carries are intended to protect the overall independency of its users, so that no single group can impose a non-free version of the whole thing.

Re: The problem with GPL

[Anonymous Coward]

No, but I'm incapable of doing things that I could if you released it and the code was GPL, because then I'd have got the source code of your changes.

Re:The problem with GPL

[Anonymous Coward]

No it isn't. Binary blobs don't violate the GPL. That's why they exist without legal repercussion. You probably think Linus is on to something. Let the non-lawyers talk about legal issues. Dumbass.

Re:The problem with GPL

[Anonymous Coward]

My freedom to own you as a slave is imposed on by your freedom not to be a slave.

The developer's freedom to release a binary blob without source imposes on the user's freedom to change the functionality of that blob later.

Freedom involves complex choices. If you believe that isn't true, report to Raqqa as a volunteer slave since you are now imposing on ISIS's freedom and there can't possibly be any contradiction.

Re:The problem with GPL

[Raenex]

Binary blobs don't violate the GPL.

Yes they do, but I wasn't talking in particular about the firmware issue, if that's what you mean. I'm talking about the requirement to release source code as an "essential freedom":

The freedom to study how the program works, and change it so it does your computing as you wish (freedom 1). Access to the source code is a precondition for this.

Re:The problem with GPL

[Raenex]

My freedom to own you as a slave is imposed on by your freedom not to be a slave.

Being a slave owner involves force over another, making them take actions against their will.

The developer's freedom to release a binary blob without source imposes on the user's freedom to change the functionality of that blob later.

There is no force on the user to accept the binary in the first place. Once they have the binary, they are free to change it as they wish. To require the developer to also release the binary is to force an action on his part.

Freedom involves complex choices. If you believe that isn't true, report to Raqqa as a volunteer slave since you are now imposing on ISIS's freedom and there can't possibly be any contradiction.

And so concludes our Bad Analogy of the Day segment.

Re:The problem with GPL

[Anonymous Coward]

I categorically reject the notion that I am under some ethical compulsion to encourage others to steal from me and use my own work against me. If the code isn't free, the personal freedom aspect is meaningless.

Re:The problem with GPL

[Anonymous Coward]

A freedom to swing my fist right onto your nose IS a freedom. See, I'm more free if don't need to check who dolt dares to put their nose right in front of my awesome fistswinging performance. I'm fully aware that this pretty cool freedom might conflict with something you perceive as your freedom, but suck is life. Someone's gotta compromise.

Re: The problem with GPL

[Billly Gates]

No it does not. I can not use it at work. If I write a program and want to link to a GPL library it then infects my programs forcing me to open source it. I can not sell my product or company either which makes the asset value to 0.

How is that fair to me?

Re:The problem with GPL

[Billly Gates]

No the GPL takes away my freedom to develop software the way I like and use. The BSD license gives me freedom to do whatever I want like making a firewall product or a cloud app without having to give out my investor funded work away and I can sell my company as it's assets have value because they are not free.

A license should never telll you what to do. Even a MS EULA doesn't tell me what I can do with the software I use or create. Only how much I need to pay for extra usage or features.

In this way the GPL is the most restrictive license out there.

Re: The problem with GPL

[johnw]

No it does not. I can not use it at work.

There's nothing intrinsic in the GPL which prevents you using it at work. Your employer may have such a restriction, but that's a feature of your employer, not of the GPL.

If I write a program and want to link to a GPL library it then infects my programs forcing me to open source it.

Saying "infects" is using a deliberately emotive word to try to hide the truth.

Two points here.

1) Libraries generally use the LGPL for precisely this reason.

2) Even if you've found a library licensed under the GPL, it doesn't require you to open source your program. However, if you choose to distribute the program then you need to pass on the same permissions as you were granted. That's kind of the point of the licence.

I can not sell my product or company either which makes the asset value to 0.

Completely untrue. The GPL explicitly permits the sale of GPLed software.

Re:The problem with GPL

[Anonymous Coward]

Different AC here. I think he thinks all gifts should be no-strings-attached, otherwise he doesn't want it. Like it should be up to the recipient what the license terms are.

People like this seem to think they have a right to do whatever they want with other people's code, when in fact no such right exists.

Re:The problem with GPL

[NotInHere]

Even a MS EULA doesn't tell me what I can do with the software I use or create

The GPL doesn't restrict _usage_ of a program. If you just run GIMP to create an image, that image's copyright is yours, and yours only. If you use GCC to compile a program, that program is yours (its a bit more complicated here, as there is a tiny statically linked part but that has an extra exception from the GPL that turns off the copyleft part). The GPL only restricts redistributions of the program, or parts of it. I am pretty sure that the MS EULA completely forbids you to redistribute any parts of the OS to people without a valid license license AT ALL. The GPL gives you more options here than the MS EULA: instead of a strict ban of redistribution, it gives you certain rules you have to abide with. Maybe if you don't like to copyleft something, then you won't want to redistribute, but you do have more options than the MS EULA gives you.

Re: The problem with GPL

[Anonymous Coward]

What the fuck are you talking about? No one is stealing from you. Pro tip: nobody gives a shit about your code bro. I bet even if it was BSDL, your GitHub page would still be a ghost down with tumbleweed and dust blowing around. You could hear a pin drop.

Re: The problem with GPL

[Billly Gates]

Who the hell would buy my asset if they had to give it away to competitors for free?

Sure the code is free for the user but not for the developers or owner which is my point. BSD is free for both as tax payers came from both. Everyone wins. I think it's immoral to force people to do things they don't want to do.

I am also capitalistic. If someone wants to make money and needs resources from people full time and not volunteers they should do just that. BSD allows this

Re: The problem with GPL

[johnw]

Who the hell would buy my asset if they had to give it away to competitors for free?

You don't have to give it away to anyone.

Sure the code is free for the user but not for the developers or owner which is my point. BSD is free for both as tax payers came from both.

It's anyone's guess what either of these sentences is meant to mean.

I think it's immoral to force people to do things they don't want to do.

True enough, but since no-one is forcing anyone to do anything, not really relevant to the issue under discussion.

I think perhaps you should actually read the GPL carefully. You have an awful lot of misconceptions about it. Summarised in a rather simplified form it says,

"Here's some code. You can do anything you like with it except restrict what other people can do with it."

Yes, that annoys freeloaders like Microsoft who would prefer to take free code and then put commercial restrictions on it, but it's an eminently fair arrangement.

Re: The problem with GPL

[Billly Gates]

Technically if I sold my company that is a redistribution according to the GPL. The buyer would be forced to give away the asset for free which is why the lawyers I met do not like it.

I am not saying I like EULa's from MS but I was making a point. I can link to com objects in a crappy VB written program but still can sell it. MS has no problem with this at all as long as I paid for their software properly to make it.

What if for example I use a GPL api call for printf (making this one up) but make everything else in house and spent millions. I want to sell my company. Am I freeloading as now the whole product goes GPL as it counts as a redistribution? I know viral sounds offensive, but it is what RMS wanted to end proprietary software.

I think Apache, Xorg, FreeBSD, Samba, node.js, and others do well for BSD/MIT licenses. We got PF sense, Juniper, Early Cisco IOS, MacOSX, Windows share and printer support for mac/linux users, and can now use Visual Studio community edition for odd things like Android and node.js development. No you did not misread that as MS code editor is cross platform and even runs on Linux thanks to BSD licensed code.

I think everyone wins and yes some capitalism is nice for progress in addition of academia and community.

Re:The problem with GPL

[Anonymous Coward]

> No the GPL takes away my freedom to develop software the way I like and use.

Uh, no. The GPL prohibits you from developing with someone else's code however you like.

You have perfect freedom to develop software however you like, under whatever license you like. It's called writing your own fucking code instead of trying to leech off someone else's.

Re: The problem with GPL

[unixisc]

Alice writes her software thingie, and later extends its functionality. She finds something written under the QPL that helps her do that, and doesn't have to worry about whether she can use that w/ what she wrote. Later, she finds a bug fix under CDDL which would actually be useful for her as well, so she again goes ahead and uses it. She finds pre-processed code w/o the source that works w/ it, and freely combines it w/ her own work.

In the meantime, Bob finds that Sandra did improvize on his code for in-house use in his company. When Bob requested it, Sandra declined, saying that the enhancements revealed a lot of proprietary company information beyond even patents. Bob brings up the GPL, to which Sandra responded that she's not distributing that code anywhere, so doesn't have to provide that source code to anyone. Bob then finds that Mike too has been writing enhancements to his software and selling it. Bob then asks Mike to show him his source code, and Mike asks him to buy a copy for $399. Bob refuses, and brings up the GPL. Mike tells him that he only has to share it w/ people he distributes it to, and since Bob refused to buy the software, he doesn't have to give him the source code either.

In their arguement, Alice brings up the smoothness by which she could enhance what she was doing. Bob stayed on the person who shared the improvements under the impression that he had to, when he didn't

Re: The problem with GPL

[Anonymous Coward]

The buyer would be forced to give away the asset for free which is why the lawyers I met do not like it.

What makes you think it's their asset? It's GPL'd code; it's a derived work per copyright law, and belongs to the original author.

Re: The problem with GPL

[johnw]

Technically if I sold my company that is a redistribution according to the GPL.

Presumably you mean, "If I were to take some GPL software, add to it, and then sell my rights in it to someone else, then I could not grant them permission to add restrictions to the use of the GPL software." Quite correct. That's the point of the GPL.

The buyer would be forced to give away the asset for free

You've promulgated this idea before, and it remains completely untrue. Read the GPL.

I am not saying I like EULa's from MS but I was making a point. I can link to com objects in a crappy VB written program but still can sell it.

And you can link to an LGPL library (the normal licence for a library) and still sell it. And indeed, you can link to a GPL library (if you can find one) and still sell it, albeit with some restrictions on the licence under which you sell it.

What if for example I use a GPL api call for printf (making this one up)

Yes, that's the trouble - you're making things up. It's called setting up a straw man. If you link to printf (typically coming from the library shipped with GNU C) then you are linking to an LGPL product and it imposes no requirements on you to open source your code.

You're muddling up two cases to try to make a non-existent point.

If you link an LGPL library into your code then there is no requirement for you to make your code open source.

If you take a GPL product (which generally isn't a linkable library - it's a complete implementation of something), modify it, and then want to sell it, you can't sell it under a licence any more restrictive than the one which you received it under. There is no requirement on you to let anyone else have a copy of it at all, nor is there any restriction on you selling it.

Nobody forces you to make modifications to a GPL product, but if you choose to do so, and want to redistribute it, then you can't take permissions away from others. That's eminently reasonable.

Re: The problem with GPL

[johnw]

The buyer would be forced to give away the asset for free which is why the lawyers I met do not like it.

What makes you think it's their asset? It's GPL'd code; it's a derived work per copyright law, and belongs to the original author.

Not quite. Copyright in the original code vests with the original author. Copyright in the modifications vests with the modifier. The modifier has no requirement on him to redistribute the code at all - he can just use it in house for whatever reason he wants. No-one has a right to demand a copy of it.

If however the modifier chooses to distribute the modified version of the code - either free of charge, or charging as much money for it as he likes - then he must pass on the same permissions to the recipient. Even having distributed it, there is still no requirement on him to give copies to anyone other than those he chooses to give them to - either because he likes them, or because they have paid him loads of dosh. He does however have to pass on all the source code, either at the same time as he provides the executable, or with an offer to provide it later. This of course is how he got the source code in the first place.

Despite the GP's repeated claim, he doesn't have to give it away to anyone.

Re: The problem with GPL

[Anonymous Coward]

Incorrect. You can only make and distribute derivative works with permission of the original author under U.S. copyright law. The GPL lays out terms under which you can make and distribute such derivative works, and if you don't abide by those terms then you have no copyright on your derivative work.

Re: The problem with GPL

[bingoUV]

How is that fair to me?

You did none of the work, and you can use it for some purposes. You already got more than your fair share of rights.

Re: The problem with GPL

[Anonymous Coward]

But really, Alice won't find shit because any improvements a corporation makes to code is considered an asset or business advantage and not many companies give such things away. They patent them instead.

Re: The problem with GPL

[OrangeTide]

You can take my BSD-licensed software, add 1 function to it as GPL, and now you have some GPL software. Look at how my license offers more freedom than yours, because the reverse is not true.

Re:The problem with GPL

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, you aren't likely going to stop a motivated government from doing what it wants. I'm not sure you could even gain any traction with Iran, China, or North Korea if they used GPL code for a firewall project. If a US government contractor used GPL code in a weapon that was part of a black project, you are unlikely going to get any traction with a civil law case against them. GPL isn't bullet proof, it requires a working copyright law to be enforceable, and some entities are above the law.
But maybe this is something so rare that we can just ignore it, and it appears that hypothetical situation is already ignored by most GPL advocates. But I think it is a fair counter when the argument that a BSD project might be used in a weapon is presented.

Re: The problem with GPL

[Anonymous Coward]

If you sell your company, then, yes, that's a redistribution, and whoever buys your company has the same rights as you do and the same responsibilities, which do not include any requirement to distribute anything. You can distribute GPLed code to one person and no one else. What you can't do is forbid that one person from redistributing. If you have delusions to the contrary because of your lawyers, you need new lawyers.

There is absolutely nothing preventing you from selling GPLed code for whatever you can get. It isn't a good model for shrink-wrap software, since it's perfectly legal for the person who buys the first copy to redistribute to everyone else, but it works with lots of other types of software.

If you spend millions developing software, and then use somebody else's code for one minor thing, and that code does not come with a license you like, you're an idiot. If you did that by accident, and got called out on it, you'd have to change your software to not use that code if it was GPLed code; commercial licenses can be less forgiving. Under no circumstances would you be forced to release your software under the GPL. You would not have accepted the license, and you would have distributed somebody else's copyright code without a license.

RMS thinks proprietary software is evil (an opinion I don't share), but his idea for fighting it was to create a large GPLed code ecosystem, superior to proprietary alternatives, so that living in the GPL ecosystem would work better than living outside it. RMS wanted to entice people to build on GPLed software to make it worth their while to GPL their software, not trick anyone into anything.

if nobody enforced the GPL by litigation

[FudRucker]

then soon every greedy capitalist in the software industry would be scalping code and using it in their products and selling it for top dollar and without releasing the source code, people like microsoft, apple, google, oracle, etc... they would all be raping your code for profits if the threat of litigation did not hang over their heads

Re:if nobody enforced the GPL by litigation

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, sounds like Linus likes the sausage but is disgusted by how it's made.

Re:if nobody enforced the GPL by litigation

[Anonymous Coward]

And suing you for divulging THEIR secret... even if you were the developer.

Re:if nobody enforced the GPL by litigation

[Anonymous Coward]

No they wouldn't.
The best programmers usually have more spine than that, as they understand what it has taken others to produce the code.
Would you work for such a company, that "rapes" your peers? I wouldn't.

I don't get it. If we now would swap "GPL" with "artists copyrights", parent would be modded troll, not insightfull. Yet, there would be absolutely no moral difference.

Re:if nobody enforced the GPL by litigation

[FudRucker]

RE: "Would you work for such a company, that "rapes" your peers?"

ask that question to a few Microsoft employees

Re:if nobody enforced the GPL by litigation

[Billly Gates]

You mean those greedy capitalists that employee and make products like Cisco, Juniper, PF Sense, MacOSX? All were based on BSD because it was more free and have contributed to everyone both users, venture capitalists, and customers who want to buy. Everyone won.

Apache and XORG are BSD/MIT and so is Samba. They make great free software you use reading this. I have no problem with Apple, Google, and even MS using these. Visual Studio 2015 community edition has node.js support and so does the MS code editor which has a linux version by the way. Thanks to a BSD license it was possible.

If you do not want to use it then great. But some of us have no quarrel and even encourage those who want to make money. I think both free, academia, and capitalism can all work hand and hand.

But yes GPL is a problem if you want to sell your assets and they are GPL licensed. Technically that is another party and your buyer has to give out their product for free. This is not about stealing someone's elses work. This is about just freaking using a GPL api and have the rest of the code in house?!

Re:if nobody enforced the GPL by litigation

[Anonymous Coward]

> But yes GPL is a problem if you want to sell your assets and they are GPL licensed.

Don't be absurd. If you buy the copyright on a work, you can re-license it however you want.

Sure, the world may already have the older GPL'd version, but you can close it up if you want and sell the new improved version. This has in fact happened to software products in the past.

Communities have to exclude some people

[bug1]

The reason the GPL (or any other licence) is enforced, is specifically to try and exclude people.
Every community has rules and responsibilities it places on its members, if there are people or groups that actively work against the interests of the community, then they should be excluded.
The well defined expectations set out by the FSF (4 freedoms) are what define the community, and what separates it from BSD crowd, whos community has not grown to the same extent.
There is an community around the GPL specifically because it is enforced.
If the GPL (or any other licence) isnt enforced it becomes in practice a permissive licence, much like the BSD, no values, no community.

Re:Communities have to exclude some people

[Anonymous Coward]

Communities have to exclude some people

Niggers?

Re:Communities have to exclude some people

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd say the real way to look at it is if a lawsuit has started over the GPL, then it means someone has already left the community (or was never a part of it in the first place) and is acting 180 to the purpose of the community (to share the code and improvements made).

So the idea that GPL lawsuits are damaging the community is dubious at best. The lawsuits are correcting the damage already done to the community before it spreads further.

Freedom of the code, not the coder

[Atmchicago]

The point of the GPL is to make the code free, not the coders. When starting, you're free to choose the GPL or not, and thus the GPL never revokes that initial freedom from you. GPL code can never be reverted to a less free state, whereas code under other licenses, such as BSD, can.

Re:Freedom of the code, not the coder

[OrangeTide]

The original BSD fork is still as free as it ever was. There may be other forks in different states.

GPL removes the code's freedom to have children.

Re:Freedom of the code, not the coder

[The Evil Atheist]

First, many GPLd software is a fork, making your assertion empirically false.

Second, GPL does not prevent you from forking, provided the changes made to the fork are made available to people who receive your software.

Third, it is arguable whether having proprietary children increases freedom in any way. It may increase freedom only for the one transfer, but it stops there. GPL tries to get the same freedoms to everyone along the chain. And if there is no chain, like the Linux kernel, that's because people chose to contribute directly to the project instead of forking, which still maximizes the freedom for as many people.

Re:Freedom of the code, not the coder

[Anonymous Coward]

The original BSD fork is still as free as it ever was. There may be other forks in different states.

GPL removes the code's freedom to have children.

If only someone removed YOUR right to have children. :-D

Seriously though. GPL doesn't remove any of your rights. All GPL does is prevents you USING SOMEONE ELSE'S WORK INCORPORATED INTO OR AS THE BASIS OF YOUR OWN and refusing to allow others to use YOUR WORK THAT IS A REVISION OF SOMEONE ELSE'S WORK the same way YOU were allowed to.

To put it simply, suppose I wrote a story, and left the ending blank. I published it saying, "you can write your own ending, and freely redistribute the entire work, my writing AND yours, but ONLY if you ALSO allow people the same freedom I allowed you." That is, you can't take MY work, write your own ending, publish the WHOLE THING, and tell people, "No portion of this work may be reproduced or distributed by any means..." If you write your own ending, and publish it SEPARATELY of course, you can do whatever the fuck you want with it, you can restrict it any way you like, as long as you are not using MY work and then publishing it in such a way as to prevent other people having the same freedom you have.

Also, if you AREN'T republishing it, or distributing it in any way, you can do whatever you want with it at home, yourself, even if it's GPL'ed. The requirements to give attribution, and make the source code to the original and your edits available only apply if you're sharing it. No one is going to break into your home, guns drawn, because you modified GPL'ed code if you haven't given it to anyone else, especially since no one would have any way of knowing you did it. DUH! So to recap:

GPL does not restrict your rights in any way other than preventing you from using it in such a way as to restrict other people's rights. If you want to distribute your software and restrict other people being able to do stuff with it, like with a copyright, by all means do. Just don't incorporate someone else's work you got for free into your damned software. If you DO incorporate someone who released his code with the stipulation that you have to release yours too if you incorporated his work into yours... then you have to pay it forward too. It's really pretty simple.

Wouldn't it be great if people knew what the fuck they were talking about or weren't allowed to talk? What a quiet world it would be...

Re:Freedom of the code, not the coder

[HiThere]

Not even that. If you write the entire body of code, you continue to hold the copyright, and can thus use it and release it under whatever additional licenses you choose. It's only restrictive on your use of other people's code.

Re:Freedom of the code, not the coder

[OrangeTide]

Is it a fork when the changes are frequently brought "upstream"? Most GPL projects are more of a branch with the authority usually leading back to a central cabal who hold some influence over the copyright.

Re:Freedom of the code, not the coder

[Lost Race]

The point of the GPL is to make the code free, not the coders.

No, the GPL was designed to ensure the freedom of users to modify and adapt software for their own particular needs. It does nothing to ensure the author's freedom, or the code's freedom, whatever that might mean.

Re:Freedom of the code, not the coder

[The Evil Atheist]

Yes, it is still a fork.

Re:Freedom of the code, not the coder

[null etc.]

To put it simply, suppose I wrote a story, and left the ending blank. I published it saying, "you can write your own ending, and freely redistribute the entire work, my writing AND yours, but ONLY if you ALSO allow people the same freedom I allowed you." That is, you can't take MY work, write your own ending, publish the WHOLE THING, and tell people, "No portion of this work may be reproduced or distributed by any means..."

You are obviously forgetting that "No portion of this work may be reproduced" can only possibly apply to the scope of work which is not already freely available as part of another free work. In your example, only the ending could possibly be under the scope of restriction, since everything prior to the ending is already made freely available under the original free story. I see nothing wrong with that philosophy whatsoever. There is nothing that anyone can do to prevent the original free story from being freely available, no matter what modifications or licenses you choose to apply to your own derivation.

Wouldn't it be great if people knew what the fuck they were talking about or weren't allowed to talk?

Wouldn't it though?

Re:Freedom of the code, not the coder

[dbIII]

Second, GPL does not prevent you from forking, provided the changes made to the fork are made available to people who receive your software.

A lot of nasty stuff gets said about RMS (sometimes by me) but he has stuck to the GPL and not killed off the other version of Emacs despite how much it annoyed him that he had lost control of it.

Re:Freedom of the code, not the coder

[Anonymous Coward]

Which is why MariaDB is just a figment of someone's imagination and not a real thing at all.

Re:Freedom of the code, not the coder

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes and No. You can not revert GPL code. But if you own all the work, or have the agreement of all developer, you can get a next release of your software that is complete close source, since you always have the ownership of your original creation.

Re:Freedom of the code, not the coder

[OrangeTide]

But none of them are commercial closed source. The source code may be in difference states, but the licensing has not forked.

Re:Freedom of the code, not the coder

[OrangeTide]

The MySQL brand name is a hard thing to compete against.

PostgreSQL is a MIT-like license, and the project seems to be running nicely despite having about 20 active forks. (many of them proprietary)

"Ensures" is going a bit far

[wonkey_monkey]

The GPL ensures that nobody is ever going to take advantage of your code.

Is that like how laws against murder ensure that no-one ever gets murdered?

Re:"Ensures" is going a bit far

[Anonymous Coward]

I agree, the trouble with liking laws and hating enforcement is you don't really have laws without enforcement (likewise with GPLv2).

Re:"Ensures" is going a bit far

[Anonymous Coward]

actually it was just a pretty clearly stupid thing for Linus to have said. The GPL certainly ensures no such thing. If you are foolish enough to cast your pearls of code amongst the global swine (literary reference, no offense meant to the bovine) of the internet, you should be fully prepared for the fact that some of those piggies will take your code, perhaps even modify it, then run it on computers they own, serving their own desires and agendas, never to share any enhancements or modifications with anyone. The GPL ensures that nobody is going to take advantage of your code. LOL.

Re:"Ensures" is going a bit far

[Anonymous Coward]

Exactly. With enforcement, murders still happen. Without enforcement, it's even more of a problem.

BSD for some protocol code?

[lcall]

I also favor the GPL (or AGPL), for reasons others have explained here. But I read once somewhere(?) that the BSD license can be more useful in the limited case of promoting use of a protocol (or maybe to enable higher-quality use of the protocol). I'd be interested in others' perspectives on that, from those who normally prefer the GPL/AGPL. Especially if you know of examples.

Re:BSD for some protocol code?

[Anonymous Coward]

Not knowing examples, but it can just as well result in everyone copy-pasting the code, with two bad effects
1) It is more likely there will never be a true second implementation, leaving implementation bugs (deviations from the spec) undiscovered
2) Since the license is so permissive, it is more likely to be a true copy-paste, with ad-hoc modifications that never is updated with bug fixes

So there is just as much an argument that a permissive license may promote buggy and stagnant protocol implementations. Basically due to not encouraging as much either building a community or having your own dedicated people working on it.

Re:BSD for some protocol code?

[Anonymous Coward]

This is true with any piece of a program. If your goal are to give it wide adoption, and avoid dubious re-implementations giving (in this case) the protocol a bad reputation, then yes, a more permissive license would be useful.
I can see how communications protocols might be lifted up as such an example.

Re:A modest proposal: an alternative to court batt

[jedidiah]

That was the result of a court verdict. We're trying to avoid the lawyers here.

GPL was definitely right for Linux

[pem]

Linux got a leg up from all the Unix lawsuits, but also from all the commercial Unix vendors vying to be the next Microsoft with strategic incompatibilities.

And this valid experience obviously colored Torvalds' worldview.

Linux showed that the benefits of a common foundation far outweighed the marginal dollars lost from lock-in. So much so that if you waved a magic wand and got rid of the GPL restrictions, you'd still have everybody and his brother trying to push changes upstream. Because it's a hell of a lot easier to accept new version of code if you don't have to keep merging your customizations.

Re:GPL was definitely right for Linux

[jonwil]

Lots of entities would share their code in that circumstance because its in their best interests to do so. But a lot MORE companies (especially companies running Linux on all kinds of embedded hardware like routers and phones and tablets and such) wouldn't share if they didn't have to because its in THEIR best interests NOT to share their code.

Me personally, I think there should be MORE enforcement (via lawsuits if talking directly to the company that is violating the license doesn't work) of the GPL against companies who use the Linux kernel and dont share their code when legally required to.

Plenty of companies violate the GPL on the Linux kernel and many companies are well known as repeat offenders (taking months or even longer to release the source code corresponding to a new device or a new firmware update, releasing code that is incomplete or wont compile, releasing code that doesn't match the binaries or otherwise not properly following the GPL)

Re:GPL was definitely right for Linux

[dbIII]

Not only from there but from Microsoft's inaction.
I used Xenix in 1988 and it was as awesome as linux was in 1994. If it wasn't for infighting and "not invented here" at Redmond we could have had a wave of cheap *nix workstations on PC hardware that could give Win98 a run for it's money, but in 1990!

The license is useless Linus....

[iCEBaLM]

... unless you can, and do, enforce it.

Re:The license is useless Linus....

[Anonymous Coward]

only legally, not tactically or politically

Re:The license is useless Linus....

[Anonymous Coward]

Not really.
See GKH's rant on this.

Basically, you get major asshole points if you don't adhere to it, and you get the cooperation of free (volunteer), skilled programmers if you do - it's a matter of incentivisation.

Although advocating this makes the GPL feel like more of a handshake agreement than a binding legal contract, making it a license gives the "hippy" programmers (who want to push "foreign" and "3rd party" code into the product) some backup and bargaining power when standing up to management.

Re:The license is useless Linus....

[Anonymous Coward]

There is enforcing a license and throwing around badly planned out lawsuits over every little assumption. The second does nothing to protect the code and everything to destroy the community. Linux is a community project with large contributions by various corporations and it is in Linus best interrest that this relationship is not poisoned by sue happy little retards.

The case Linus critisized is a great example of this. Lawyers without any experience to their name (their page mentions a single default jugement) joined up with a developer who somehow knew that VMWare stole his code, publicy attacking VMWare over months only to have their lawsuit fail catastrophically. Going by the article on it they either had every single piece of "evidence" dismissed or tried to base everything on the developers expert opinion "they stole my code" which the court also dismissed. Even if the court case wasn't just because of the money, which the lawyers conviniently ran out of and needed donations, it ultimately only showed that a Linux contributor could be attacked at any time and suffer months of public attacks before the situation can be resolved in court.

Re:The license is useless Linus....

[Anonymous Coward]

What a misanthropic sentiment you have there!
Most people (I hope) still desire the world to be a good place, and do respect the wishes of those who give them gifts. Which means the licensing is far from useless.
Checking the license is always the first thing we do when considering using some piece of software. Its merits and applicability come as a good second.
Horrible to think people have modded this 5-Insightful. But then, this is slashdot, where cynisim is king, so there might be hope for the world in general yet.

captcha: presents

Re:The license is useless Linus....

[The Evil Atheist]

If you read Greg and Linus' actual comments in the mailing list, they're not against enforcement. They're against getting lawyers to do the enforcement. They prefer to enforce it by convincing the actual developers (not their employers or their lawyers) to comply.

Re:The license is useless Linus....

[jez9999]

Basically, you get major asshole points if you don't adhere to it, and you get the cooperation of free (volunteer), skilled programmers if you do - it's a matter of incentivisation.

It needs to be legally binding. Microsoft don't mind pissing off their own users! I hardly think they'll mind pissing off some Linux developers.

Author Rights

[Anonymous Coward]

As the original author, you are able to fork your own code from GPL to proprietary. It does not change the license of any previously released GPL code. This happened to Nessus.

Anyone can run with the open source fork of your product, OpenVAS in this case, but they may not change the original GPL license of your code.

Affero GPL

[Anonymous Coward]

There are variants for v2/v3 (the v2 one may be GPL v1.5, read up on the history of it to be sure.)

The Affero GPL closes most remaining loopholes in the normal GPLv2/v3 by making clients of any systems using AGPL'd software responsible for distributing changes to their software to any users of their service as well as any third parties to whom they provide binary copies of the software.

This basically eliminates the proprietization of GPL'd source code for SaaS backends by ensuring that you are still required to provide the software to end users of the service, thereby eliminating the chance of the service being shut down and the changes done on its behalf being lost.

Some people may disagree with the reasoning behind that, but they can always use an APSL/MIT/BSD/proprietarily licensed set of backend software instead of AGPL'd software and pay for it in other ways than releasing their code.

Re:Affero GPL

[Sax Russell 5449D29A]

This was very informative, I'll have to read up on it.

Make up your mind Linus

[Anonymous Coward]

I think Linus needs to make up his mind about the GPL.

Re: We love you, mr. Torvalds you systemd loving

[Anonymous Coward]

What BSD essentially means to me is "no SystemD", and that's a reason enough to adopt it, license or OS.

Re:Your missing the real mistake ...

[The Evil Atheist]

He's talking about Linux as the KERNEL, genius. You know, since it's what he WORKS ON.

the right to free everything and everyone

[OrangeTide]

We're not talking about rights. we're talking about freedom.

Not having the freedom to put graffiti on your fence is less freedom. Obviously I don't have the right to do such a thing, but it is a reduction of my freedom. (hopefully that analogy helps you understand the difference between a right and a freedom)

Now that is out of the way. If I cannot incorporate your code into my project without changing my license to match yours, then I have less freedom. (you can use the physical sense of the word, as in degrees of freedom, if that helps you understand.). You failed to grant me the right to do as I please with your code. Instead of a gift, you have shared something you made with some strings attached.

That's fine. I don't blame you for not giving me gifts. But my code is a gift to you. I expect nothing in return, I do not expect you to reciprocate and carry on with the gift-giving. I only hope that it brings you some happiness or ease in your life. If my code saves you an hour of work on a project, an hour you could spend with your family, then that is really the highest measure of success in my opinion.

Re:the right to free everything and everyone

[null etc.]

Thank you for stating this so eloquently.

Re:the right to free everything and everyone

[Anonymous Coward]

So what if I use your code inside a weapon system, eg to control a bomb that I'm going to use to to blow up someone's family?

Are you happy with that? Is that also your highest measure of success?

If you put no restrictions at all on usage, then you have some responsibility in how it gets used.

Re:the right to free everything and everyone

[Anonymous Coward]

Sure, but it's copyright law that reduces your freedom here, not GPL. We're talking about rights you don't have by law.

The only "strings" attached are that you can't attach additional strings while distributing the GPL'd code someone else gave you.

It's really pretty simple. If you don't want to share your code, don't use GPL'd code in your project.

Re:the right to free everything and everyone

[Zontar The Mindless]

"With great freedom comes great responsibility."

Re:the right to free everything and everyone

[OrangeTide]

I'm not happy that you're building weapons. But my code is probably not ready-to-use for a weapon, you had to do something to adapt it. And you had to manufacture explosives and whatnot as well.

I can't be responsible for the actions of other people. And the warranty statement on the BSD/MIT/ISC license attempts to make sure I'm not responsible for you choosing to use my code.

Re:the right to free everything and everyone

[OrangeTide]

Public Domain still exists in some jurisdictions. But FSF has sent out a clear message that you should not skip copyright law by using public domain. FSF wants you you to use copyleft, which instead of forcing you to license a work from the creator, forces you to give up a copy of your creation. That's the end game here folks.

Re:the right to free everything and everyone

[Anonymous Coward]

You have a strange habit of using the word "force" when you mean "lets you choose."

Re:the right to free everything and everyone

[The Evil Atheist]

If I cannot incorporate your code into my project without changing my license to match yours, then I have less freedom.

Instead of a gift, you have shared something you made with some strings attached.

Failure to appease your sense of entitlement is not reducing your freedom.

If the person did not open their code at all, which is the default state under copyright law, you had NO FREEDOM to begin with. So if someone opens their code up as GPL, by any measure, your freedom increased. Just because it didn't increase as much as you'd like doesn't mean your freedom is reduced. The default state of affairs is that you have NO freedom to use their code in the first place and that is the state you must start measuring from. Not the state where all code is public domain.

And no, GPL is not a gift. Open source is not a gift. No one is obligated to gift you anything.

Re:the right to free everything and everyone

[OrangeTide]

You have no choice if you attempt to distribute GPL software. The license is pretty clear, and has been enforced in a few jurisdictions already.

If I had a choice, I would use the software and not follow the license. But the license isn't some list of suggestions, it's an enforcible contract.
The only choice I have is to avoid copying or modifying the software. And software that you can't modify is probably not software that I would want to use.

I suppose I have a similar philosophy to RMS, but instead of using the force of law to carry out my philosophy, I would rather use my own behavior as a model for others to choose to follow.

Re:the right to free everything and everyone

[Anonymous Coward]

Of course you have a choice. You can choose not to distribute. Or you can choose to distribute while abiding by the license terms. Or you can write your own code. Nobody is "forcing" you to do anything.

> If I had a choice, I would use the software and not follow the license.

I see. Your problem is, you think you have the right to use other people's code however you want. You don't.

Re:the right to free everything and everyone

[OrangeTide]

I see. Your problem is, you think you have the right to use other people's code however you want. You don't.

You missed the part in my post: "But the license isn't some list of suggestions, it's an enforcible contract."

It's a pity you overlooked that, you could have got me for a misspelled word.

Re:the right to free everything and everyone

[OrangeTide]

Failure to appease your sense of entitlement is not reducing your freedom.

Please explain. You may not value one or more freedoms, so when they are not granted to you it probably isn't a big deal to you. But logically you have less freedom over some other person's creation if they have licensed under GPL. But if I license my own creation under BSD, I have lost nothing, except my ability to dictate how others use my software.

Honestly, I don't really see the point in people thinking they have exclusive ownership of an idea. Ideas are intangible, and knowledge is easily transferable.

(I really wasn't looking for a license flamewar with my OP. I'm still aiming for some rational discourse on the subject. There are certainly good reasons to use GPL, but my core argument is that freedom cannot be a one of those reasons)

Re:the right to free everything and everyone

[Anonymous Coward]

Except that the GPL isn't a contract. It isn't a license agreement. It's just a license.

It specifies what you MAY do, but doesn't require you to do anything.

Ensuring freedom requires enforcement

[jbn-o]

Just as we come closer to ensuring no murders when we enforce laws against murder, we come closer to ensuring the software freedom described in the GPL when we enforce the GPL.

It's telling that Linus Torvalds said "I really think the license has been one of the defining factors in the success of Linux because it enforced that you have to give back, which meant that the fragmentation has never been something that has been viable from a technical standpoint." and hates enforcement ("Lawyers: poisonous to openness..."). The fork of the Linux kernel Torvalds distributes contains the "fragmentation" he claims isn't viable—Torvalds' variant of Linux contains proprietary binaries in it. These blobs of code are removed in the fully-free GNU Linux-libre kernel.

Linus Torvalds' position is more easily understood when you consider that Torvalds is a fan of the right-wing, proprietor-friendly open source movement which is a reaction to the older free software movement. The difference between the two movements has been described in writing (older essay, newer essay) and in every RMS speech for years.

You can see that difference playing out in Linus Torvalds' dig against GPL enforcement. Brad Kuhn, President and Distinguished Technologist of the Software Freedom Conservancy talked about the value of GPL enforcement in his most recent talk on the issue at linux.conf.au in 2016 in his talk "Copyleft For the Next Decade: A Comprehensive Plan", "Copyleft is not magic pixie dust; you don't sprinkle it on some code and then suddenly your code is liberated forever. I wish that were true but that's not how the world works." (9m2s). The way Torvalds talks about the GPLv2 you'd think the GPLv2 were magic pixie dust because that's what he wants Linux kernel copyright holders to believe—an unenforced GPL is fine—because Torvalds, like any good sycophant for proprietary software, knows what Kuhn reminds us of in Kuhn's talk, (around 13m1s), "If a copyleft license is not enforced it's indistinguishable from a non-copylefted license in practice.". But where Torvalds takes that as an instruction to not act in defense of the GPL, Kuhn says that as a warning against software proprietarism. Conservancy is the group doing that enforcement work to help assure all computer users actually get the freedoms of free software the GPL describes. That work includes GPL enforcement, specifically a coordinated compliance effort across multiple Conservancy projects.

Re:Ensuring freedom requires enforcement

[KozmoStevnNaut]

The fork of the Linux kernel Torvalds distributes contains the "fragmentation" he claims isn't viable—Torvalds' variant of Linux contains proprietary binaries in it. These blobs of code are removed in the fully-free GNU Linux-libre kernel.

Hold up now, mr. FSF.

The kernel that Linus distributes is the Linux kernel, by definition.

Linux-Libre is a fork for FSF puritans.

Re:Your missing the real mistake ...

[Anonymous Coward]

lol! And the hipster goober takes it in the face. This kind of talk pisses me off. There's a reason there's 57 distros - because people like to work on stuff, and they want to do it their way. It's their right, with their time. I don't know what it is about some people that makes them feel they're invested enough in Linux to tell the people doing the work what to do. It's like they think we're all naive savants who are just missing a kind word, a pat on the head, and a finger pointing us in the right direction.

Guess what? We know what you're saying, and we don't care, because Linux is freedom to do what we want, and what we want is to do our own thing. Not work tirelessly like Santa's elves, to give you free shit. I have to say if anything, one of the reasons free software has worked out so well over the years is the number of competing projects - don't like openssl? get libressl. don't like how ubuntu does things? get slackware. It's a good thing. What's not good are losers demanding we all assemble to complete Pharaoh's Pyramid.

Cake

[Anonymous Coward]

So Linux wants to eat the cake too? He chose GPL but does not care to enforce it. Great. IBM, Intel, etc no long have to contribute to the piece of shit.

Words of wisdom from Linus

[JesseEnjaian]

quite apart from the risk of loss in a court, the real risk is something that happens whether you win or lose, and in fact whether you go to court or just threaten: the loss of community, and in particular exactly the kind of community that can (and does) help. You lose your friends."

Lawsuits always create divisions and force people to take sides. It can be really fun. But it's also probably something you shouldn't do to colleagues and friends because computer science is a small world.

How can that be a your reply?

[Anonymous Coward]

How is that a reply? Did you not read what I wrote?

He said the GPL avoids fragmentation. A very dubious claim, I cited some examples.

And I mentioned why the kernel may be somewhat of an exception in this particular case. Did you not read that?

Re:How can that be a your reply?

[The Evil Atheist]

What you wrote was completely irrelevant to what Linus was saying. My reply was pointing that irrelevance out, so I'm in no way obligated to address your point. Linus was clearly talking about the kernel, because THAT IS HIS JOB, when he was talking about fragmentation. Just because you want to strawman his quote to what you want to rant about does not make it his intention.

Re:Your missing the real mistake ...

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually it sounds more like his skills of articulation were suffering during those seconds. After all, Android is the example that counters your point.

Re:Your missing the real mistake ...

[Anonymous Coward]

I disagree and think you didn't give enough credit to 'individuality' for being responsible for forking. Forks happen because people have differing goals, and often enough people come to the decision to go their seperate ways and work independently. Personally I'm disgusted by how so many community leaders try to spin that scenario as negative. Those are the folks that seem to be implying - "if you don't agree with the groupthink consensus, you are an unharmonious drag on our unity". Jesus.

Lawyers and other political animals..

[thesupraman]

Once upon a time I asked the x264 people if I could ship the x264 installer inside a bundle of software I was selling.
note: I didnt ship it, I politely asked if that would be ok.

The answer I got back was, in short 'That makes your whole system GPL, please give us your details so we can pass them to our lawyers'
Now, I thought that was a little crazy, so, again, I politely asked why they thought that would apply if I did ship their installer.

'You have linked our code as a core part of your system, therefore you are a derivative system, send us your details immediately!'
Again, I asked 'that seems very odd, I certainly wont be using your system at all, however could you please tell me why you think that a piece
of software that the end user will install, that is only accessed through windows Directshow standard interfaces would make my software derivative?'

I was told to direct that question to my own lawyers, since 'they do not provide free legal advice', and again asked to provide my details to THEIR lawyers.

Needless to say, I never, ever, EVER used x264, or recommended it to my users.
The only reason I was asking to include it was to save them downloading it if they needed to read those particular video formats - and had exactly
zero intention of making any changes at all (of course, I was intending to distribute an exact normal distribution)

Sad really, and completely unnecessary.

Funnily enough I heard from others that the x264 people consider providing users with a button that automatically DOWNLOADS the same installer and runs
'no problem', and that they didnt consider x264 libraries in linux distributions being used by a plethora of other software to legally taint those with GPL
requirements, but they considered any shipping of an installer on windows as one.. hmmm.

I hope they enjoyed their power trip - but it just wasnt worth the legal battle/risk. I wonder if all the x264 contributors realised their contributions
were being used as a political hammer in such a way.

Re:Lawyers and other political animals..

[Anonymous Coward]

They were lying. You're free to ship any GPL'd software you like bundled with your own software, and it doesn't affect your license at all.

They were just trying to scare you into buying a proprietary license.

Re:Lawyers and other political animals..

[Anonymous Coward]

To be honest, I think you REALLY should have asked a lawyer because it seems you really have no clue.
Of course shipping it yourself is something completely different than adding a download button.
In one case you distribute (make a copy) in the other you don't.
If you don't make copies, copyright (and thus GPL) doesn't apply.
Now as for whether you shipping the installer is a "mere aggregation" under the GPL or if it's part of your product - see the discussion around Ubuntu and ZFS for how different the opinions are on that. I don't think there is clear legal precedent that means just because there is a standard API in-between that your product cannot be a derivative work (it makes it less likely though I guess).
I don't really see how it makes a difference at all whether the user installs it or not, why would you think that would matter? That's like people thinking letting their cat run over the keyboard to "accept" the EULA means they aren't bound by it.
Your outrage seem disproportional to how uncertain your legal position was in this.

Re:Lawyers and other political animals..

[NotInHere]

Linux being under the GPL doesn't make all programs on the whole ubuntu or fedora ISO gpl licensed. It all depends on the situation. Yes, the GPL needs more care to work with, and there are certainly more risks than with BSD licenses, but you have risks with BSD licenses as well. E.g. imagine if someone took some non open source code and licensed it under BSD without any agreement by the copyright holder. Then if you use that code thinking all fine its bsd licensed get into trouble as well.

The GPL is very important to not have a strategic disadvantage to closed source competition. If you are BSD licensed, your closed source competitors can simply take the code parts that are better in your program than in theirs. Not so for the GPL.

Also, x264 is still protected by patents, so you'd have to pay someone in one case or another.

Re: We love you, mr. Torvalds you systemd loving

[Anonymous Coward]

The BSD license and the incompatible set of operating systems loosely marketed as "BSD" are different things. He's talking about the license, not the operating systems.

Re: We love you, mr. Torvalds you systemd loving

[Ol Olsoc]

What BSD essentially means to me is "no SystemD", and that's a reason enough to adopt it, license or OS.

What's it like to part of the noise floor?

GPL vs BSDL

[unixisc]

Aside from being copyleft, what does the GPL do that BSDL does NOT do? If anything, the GPL came up w/ a modification to get around 'Tivoization', or using GPL code in the firmware of something. Had Linux been under GPL3, as opposed to GPL2, there's no way TiVo, or indeed a lot of applications, could have touched Linux. And Android - while the kernel is Linux, the userland is BSD, since they couldn't live w/ GPL3 either. All this suggests that had Linux been licensed under something like BSDL, as opposed to GPL anything, it would have had more widespread acceptance.

Re: GPL vs BSDL

[Anonymous Coward]

What makes GPL special is that it deals primarily with distribution. You are free to do everything you want but if you the software to someone else then the same freedoms that you were given has to be given to that person as well.

Re: GPL vs BSDL

[unixisc]

Oh, it goes well beyond that. Like Tivo did exactly what you describe, except for one thing. They locked the flash that had the firmware that used the FOSS in question, and so RMS/FSF wrote v3 of GPL to preclude anyone from doing just that.

Also, GPL prevents you from combining 'its' code w/ that of any other license. That's why you don't have ZFS directly integrated into Linux. ZFS is under the CDDL, which is an incompatible license. BSDL has nothing against its software being combined w/ other software - be it proprietary, or w/ any of the myriad licenses out there. That's why FreeBSD can have ZFS as its native file system. Linux can't, and therefore had to reinvent the wheel and make ext3/4 and btrfs both GPL.

That's way beyond mere distribution rights.

Re: GPL vs BSDL

[Anonymous Coward]

It prevents you from redistributing of you combine with an incompatible license. There are many GPL compatible licenses including the BSD license. CDDL was unfortunately made incompatible by design.

BSDL vs GPL

[unixisc]

But BSDL allows you to mix and match BSDL licensed code w/ code of any other license - be it GPL, CDDL, QPL, Apache, et al - even Proprietary. If you are the software developer, you already have the choice of taking the code of the functionality you don't want to release, and make that part of it downright proprietary. Heck, that's what Apple did - while XNU and the lower level layers are open sourced, Quartz is proprietary: when was the last time you saw Quartz source code anywhere outside Cupertino?

I don't see how the GPL forces you to push your contributions upstream. Let's say you did a driver for a trackpad and put it under GPLv3. Since you're distributing it, anybody who gets the software also gets either the code itself on the CD, or a website where to look it up, or download it from. However, upstream, the people whose project you originally used are free to ignore it. Also, if you have a policy of, say, selling your software for something other than $0.00, and upstream did not buy it, they don't get to see your code. That only has to be shown to people who got your software. Also, GPL doesn't allow you to mix GPL and proprietary software. That's a part of the blowup b/w FSF and Debian, just due to the latter telling people where to find non-free software that worked w/ their products.

Also, the upstream argument is something that's been compellingly disproven in the case of BSD. A lot of projects use FreeBSD as their platform, and don't have to 'give back'. However, in order to avoid making the same changes to every iteration of the OS, companies like Apple, Juniper, Sony, et al have made it a point to contribute upstream any changes they make in BSD code, just so that they don't have to keep doing it in every iteration. So this is a voluntary effort - people contributing upstream due to their own benefits, as opposed to something the license might force them to do.

Re:BSDL vs GPL

[swillden]

I don't see how the GPL forces you to push your contributions upstream.

"Forces" is too strong, but there's a powerful incentive to upstream changes. Not upstreaming them means that you end up maintaining a library of patches that you have to port to each new version that's released. Over time this gets to be really difficult and expensive.

Note that this is also true for BSD code... except that in the BSD world there are some legal counter-incentives that discourage you from upstreaming. Too many people will argue that because the license allows you to keep your code to yourself, you should, which leads you into a patch-maintenance hell that the business and legal types don't appreciate or understand. So, the GPL helps the technical staff by eliminating the secrecy argument and encouraging upstreaming, which eliminates patch-maintenance hell.

Also, the upstream argument is something that's been compellingly disproven in the case of BSD.

No, it hasn't. You're right that smart BSD projects do upstream changes to avoid patch maintenance hell, but it takes a particularly enlightened organization to do it. The GPL helps be eliminating the option of keeping your changes secret. In a very few cases, this is a problem because the code in question has crucial competitive value *and* can't be run effectively in userspace. But those cases are rare, and the tendency is for organizations to vastly overestimate the value of their proprietary code.

Re:BSDL vs GPL

[unixisc]

Why is having the option of not upstreaming something that disadvantages the software? Like I pointed out, Juniper and other organizations do upstream their code to the FreeBSD project, which then determines what would be good to add, and what should remain downstream.

The cases where they have to keep the code confidential is where there are more than one organization involved, and where there may be patent issues that need to be resolved before something can be thrown totally open. That's a place where GPLv3 just walks over the patent rights of anybody using it, since the FSF doesn't believe in intellectual property in the first place. BSDL leaves one's intellectual property alone, and therefore, they can use things like ZFS that Linux has to play games to run on itself

Re:BSDL vs GPL

[swillden]

Why is having the option of not upstreaming something that disadvantages the software?

I explained that in the post you replied to.

But we do care...

[Anonymous Coward]

about code that doesn't work as well, at least out of the box in a standard configuration, compiled as wireless kernel function and utilities, for Linux. At least with the major distros. WIreless just works better, and has better command line utilities, in BSD than LInux, including every Apple notebook I ever used. Recent Linux can't deal with weak or choppy signals nearly as well and also seems unable to set wireless card modes expeditiously, adding to the NetworkManager time bottleneck in Ubuntu et. al. which really sucks. So maybe nobody cares about BSD's wireless code but I guess I do because I miss wireless networking with BSD. Faster than a hot knife through butter. And I'm hating Linux more and more even though its major distros are easier to install, customize and maintain . And I'm American and Finnish. I suppose I should f****g love Linux but it's too much of a free for all and also too much trash talk from His Holinuss. Happy 25th nonetheless. He and Theo should trade places and we'll make a reality-TV comedy out of it.

Re:But we do care...

[unixisc]

Uh? I love PC-BSD and am a user myself, but WiFi support is one thing that PC-BSD is short on. I have a standard off the shelf Dell laptop w/ an Intel chipset, and in hardware recognition, PC-BSD doesn't recognize the WiFi. End result is that what would otherwise have been a laptop that I can take to bed & play w/ is a de facto desktop tethered to the table

CAD licence

[epine]

The funny thing about humans is that different humans care about different things. (Perhaps this signal becomes harder to detect as an Act III BDFL of a sprawling monoculture.)

If you regard your code as a means to an end (e.g. authoring a great web site) then perhaps it's a perfectly reasonable stance not to "care" about your code the way Linus cares about his code.

Licence of the day: Craftspeople with Attachment Disorder. Be there, or be square.

Re:Your missing the real mistake ...

[Anonymous Coward]

He's talking about Linux as the KERNEL, genius. You know, since it's what he WORKS ON.

-1, retarded

You're
-2, Ignorant

tl:dr; linus is a faggot

[Anonymous Coward]

Argument 1: Linus "doesn't care about" all the BSD code that props up his kernel and makes it relevant. OpenSSH is a good example of code that Linus doesn't want to care about. Therefore, Linus is a faggot.

Argument 2: Linux can't fix his own printer. According to himself "I am not good at IT stuff". Linus proceeds to criticize Theo from OpenBSD, a god in his own right, and calls him a "Masturbating Monkey". Therefore, Linus is a faggot.

Argument 3: Linus is from Finland. Finland joined forces with one Aryan country (Germany) to occupy another Aryan country (Norway) and to attack a neighboring Slavic country (Russia) which had recently overthrown an Aryan family (Czar), which happened to also be the Gotha family of England (Windsor), who was also at war with Germany (might as well get the most out of war profiteering), only to switch sides and then later call the German people a bunch of racists and trashed the names of all Aryans after the war was over. As a Scandinavian country they are a bunch of faggots. Therefore, Linus is a faggot.

Patent indemnity

[unixisc]

How can a license grant a patent indemnity on a patent you do not own? While the BSDL may not have thought it thru, point is that if while writing something, you accidentally (or intentionally) violate someone else's patent, your customer can't get the patent indemnity from you: they have to get it from the patent holder. Also, GPL3 is somewhat nebulous on the question of whether if you write any GPLed software, everybody downstream gets indemnity for all your patents, regardless of whether you interacted w/ them or not. Which is a can of snakes, not just worms, waiting to be opened

Re:Patent indemnity

[swillden]

How can a license grant a patent indemnity on a patent you do not own?

You obviously can't grant licenses on patents you don't own. As a downstream recipient, you get protection from patents owned by the upstream contributors. It can't do anything to protect you from third party patents.

Also, GPL3 is somewhat nebulous on the question of whether if you write any GPLed software, everybody downstream gets indemnity for all your patents, regardless of whether you interacted w/ them or not.

I think it's quite clear. Everybody downstream gets a license for all of the patents which you use in the licensed work, regardless of whether you interacted with those parties or not. It doesn't affect any other patents you happen to own.

The only real subtlety, I think is, for downstream re-distributors, who have to grant patent licenses for code they didn't write, and those grants effectively flow upstream as well as down. Of course, the license doesn't *force* them to grant those licenses, any more than linking proprietary code to GPL'd code forces you to GPL your proprietary code. It's just that choosing not to license the patents (or GPL the relevant code) means that you have no right to distribute, so any distribution you did constituted copyright infringement. Well... in the case of patents it may also mean that you implied a license which probably means that you can ask users to either pay or stop using, but can't go after them for any past infringement. And, of course, it also means that you lose the right to use and open yourself to infringement suits for your past, present and future use.

Of course, all of that only comes into play if you intend to enforce patents against others. The clear goal of GPLv3 is to discourage software patents, which I wholeheartedly support (even though my name is on a few).

NetBSD as the outlier

[unixisc]

I thought that the issue w/ NetBSD was that they were the smallest of an already shrunk subset of the FOSS world. First, you had the BSDs resurface after that lawsuit ended, and 4.4 get forked into FreeBSD and NetBSD. And after OpenBSD forked away, Theo did a good job getting his following, while FreeBSD did a great job in taking the ball forward. People who did want to play the game in the BSDL space did fine w/ either FreeBSD (mainly) or OpenBSD. NetBSD tried to claim its specialty as being the most ported, but that is nothing compared to Linux, and doesn't shine even in contrast to FreeBSD or OpenBSD. Also, there is nothing that suggests that FreeBSD is much more of a resource hog than NetBSD. Also, as an example of being most widely ported, FreeBSD had support for the Itanium (not sure whether it's still there in 11) while NetBSD never did. Also for the embedded space, Minix is a better option, being w/ a smaller footprint, but they also take NetBSD's toolchain and happily declare it.

I think the real issue is that there is no high profile company promoting the BSDs, the way there is Red Hat, Suse and others promoting Linux. These projects that don't get financed regularly have a tough ask. I know that FreeBSD does get supported by iXsystems and Apple, but I wonder how smooth that is? The way to properly support it is commercialize it by getting a company, and then owning the brand and its direction.

Re: We love you, mr. Torvalds you systemd loving

[Ol Olsoc]

What BSD essentially means to me is "no SystemD", and that's a reason enough to adopt it, license or OS.

What's it like to part of the noise floor?

Looks like a person who thinks that it is acceptable to pollute every single linux discussion with "systemd" bullshit has mod points.

This is a perfect example of how fucked up Slashdot can get every some often. Linux subject, and the trolls come out with "systemd! sysystemd!

And if someone ceomplians or tells them that their trolling is beyond pointless, they get modded down?

Sounds legit, carry on!