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Bruce Perens Warns Grsecurity Breaches the Linux Kernel's GPL License (perens.com)
Bruce Perens co-founded the Open Source Initiative with Eric Raymond. Now he's sharing a "strong opinion" that companies should avoid the Grsecurity security patch for the Linux kernel "because it presents a contributory infringement and breach of contract risk." Slashdot reader NewGnu shared Bruce's comments:
[I]t would fail a fair-use test... Because of its strongly derivative nature of the kernel, it must be under the GPL version 2 license, or a license compatible with the GPL and with terms no more restrictive than the GPL. Earlier versions were distributed under GPL version 2... My understanding from several reliable sources is that customers are verbally or otherwise warned that if they redistribute the Grsecurity patch, as would be their right under the GPL, that they will be assessed a penalty: they will no longer be allowed to be customers, and will not be granted access to any further versions of Grsecurity. GPL version 2 section 6 explicitly prohibits the addition of terms such as this redistribution prohibition...
This is tantamount to the addition of a term to the GPL prohibiting distribution or creating a penalty for distribution. GPL section 6 specifically prohibits any addition of terms. Thus, the GPL license, which allows Grsecurity to create its derivative work of the Linux kernel, terminates, and the copyright of the Linux Kernel is infringed. The contract from the Linux kernel developers to both Grsecurity and the customer which is inherent in the GPL is breached.
Perens advises companies to discuss his position with their attorneys, adding "In the public interest, I am willing to discuss this issue with companies and their legal counsel, under NDA, without charge."
This is tantamount to the addition of a term to the GPL prohibiting distribution or creating a penalty for distribution. GPL section 6 specifically prohibits any addition of terms. Thus, the GPL license, which allows Grsecurity to create its derivative work of the Linux kernel, terminates, and the copyright of the Linux Kernel is infringed. The contract from the Linux kernel developers to both Grsecurity and the customer which is inherent in the GPL is breached.
Perens advises companies to discuss his position with their attorneys, adding "In the public interest, I am willing to discuss this issue with companies and their legal counsel, under NDA, without charge."
Indeed, only real freedom gives me the right to take away somebody else's rights.
Unless of course the goal is to keep the software open/modifiable by all while disallowing poaching by closed source developers. This frees the project from parasitic closed developers. They'll have to write their own code if they want to keep it closed.
i usually fall into the "GPL is less free than BSD" camp, but in this case I agree fully with Perens. the Linux kernel is GPL, everyone who works on it agrees accepts that. if you don't like the GPL or the conditions it places on you, or how you (and others) can distribute your code - then go the fuck somewhere else.
I'll take the judgement of the guy who actually wrote the kernel over a Grsecurity shill.
How? You're completely forbidden to make derivative works of Microsoft Windows. You're also forbidden to distribute it in any way.
Indeed, as we know free is not gratis.
The GPL keeps the existing software and its derivatives free to use by and for all.
"The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
It's important to consider the goals of the GPL. You get great Free Software, but it's not a gift. It is sharing with rules that must be followed. You are required to keep it Free. And one of the implied purposes of the GPL is to cause more great Free Software to be made. This means that derivative works that are not shared really go against the purpose as well as the wording of the GPL.
Amen, it's especially through the GPL that future developers are enabled to stand on the shoulders of the present.
Nothing gets lost, we all win.
"The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
You don't hear very well. The kernel is good because they follow a process. That process involves submitting code that can be readily reviewed before being accepted. "Trust us, it's great" gets a "go fick yourself", and that is exactly as it should be. If you think ANYTHING is over their head but not over the heads of the grsecurity devs you are clueless, but even if that were the case it is up to them to justify and explain their code or beat rocks.
Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
I'd call it relinquishing control of your software. We don't touch GPL source or libraries anywhere I have worked precisely because of this show-stopping feature of GPL.
The cesspool just got a check and balance.