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Microsoft Joins Group Working To 'Cure' Open-Source Licensing Issues (zdnet.com)
Microsoft is joining Red Hat, Facebook, Google and IBM in committing to extending right to "cure" open source licensing noncompliance before taking legal measures. From a report: On March 19, officials from Microsoft -- along with CA Technologies, Cisco, HPE, SAP and SUSE -- said they'd work with open together with the already-committed vendors to provide more "predictability" for users of open source software. "The large ecosystems of projects using the GPLv2 and LGPLv2.x licenses will benefit from adoption of this more balanced approach to termination derived from GPLv3," explained Red Hat in a press release announcing the new license-compliance partners. The companies which have agreed to adopt the "Common Cure Rights Commitment" said before they file or continue to prosecute those accused of violating covered licenses, they will allow for users to cure and reinstate their licenses.
just use that license, np
That sound you heard was that of several thousand lawyers sighing at what could have been billions in lost revenue
So, the GPL isn't as cut a dried and obvious as Slashdotters insist it is.
And the issues regarding the license wasn't FUD after all.
Color me surprised! I thought all Slashdotters were legal experts.
You find yourself at the top of the slippery side of Mt. Software License.
Companies tired of getting called out for violating your open source license are offering you an olive branch one step down the slippery side.
Think hard before walking out to greet them...
Proprietary touch to the already complicated and overly verbal licenses.
Just keep the damn thing simple. licenses don't need more than a couple of lines to describe what you can and cannot do with the product. until everybody KISS, there will be more and more violations, and corporate lawyers aren't gonna KISS for sure.
Surely that would benefit commercial licenses as well, wouldn't it?
Are they going to do the same about their proprietary licenses? Yeah, sure...
The companies involved have never been known to bring suit regarding Open Source licenses. The promise to give a cure period is thus hollow.
Bruce Perens.
Microsoft is as likely to cure OSS licensing problems as undertakers are to cure cancer.
Table-ized A.I.
Surgeon Microsoft has advised the patient, "Sometimes, the easiest cure is to kill the patient."
I'm tired of being force-fed a EULA from a virtual monopoly.
...Is this is "Extend" or "Extinguish" phase?
It's surely one or the other.
When you code Free Software, you will not get paid. Eveyone will take your hard work and give you nothing in return. Your life will be even worse than the life of a slave. Slave owners historically had an obligation to feed and clothe and house their slaves. Your users will take from you and give you nothing. You will work menial jobs by day to support your coding labor by night. You will get no sleep, you will get no gratitude, you will live in poverty, and you will die in the gutter.
When you code Free Software, you lose.
The MIT license is the cure. It's the shortest blurb of text that is the most open license with the fewest repercussions. I always look for MIT software so I don't have to worry about copyright licensing and compatibility.
If they really wanted "a more balanced approach", they would give a Mulligan to anyone caught using their code. And just to be fair and balanced, they would need to make all of their code available for everyone's perusal. Yeah, right. That's going to happen.
Everyone has a choice of how they license their code. To attempt to coerce someone to license their code in any manner is nuts. That has nothing to do with open source, BSD, GPL, or proprietary software.
Simply put - These companies do not have any legal standing on any copyright issues unless they hold the god damn copyright. So what they're doing is stepping between an infringer and the copyright hold to indemnify the infringer! Just the god damn deep pockets I wanted to go after for the infringement - companies they need to be smacked down hard not with a clue-by-four but with a War Hammer 99000.
The problem in ALL of them, are that they are still licenses. Thereby still acting as if concepts like "copyright" or "intellectual property" were legitimate, and not merely the handing of privileges to criminals so that they can rake in money without working for it.
I use only one (non-)license on all my software. The "NOLICENSE license":
The intention is, to get people to deliberately employ civil disobedience and reject "intellectual property" concepts, and prevent them from ever using those concepts again, after having used my software even once. If they don't like it, they can of course just not use my software, and fuck right off! Fucking organized criminals / pirates!
'fix' the license problem.
and it's a problem for who, exactly?
riiiiight...
On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.
"When we get caught stealing, we get to make it go away instead of paying any penalties. It's the American way."
The GPLv2 forbids the imposition of additional restrictive terms. GRSecurity imposed an additional restrictive term. No you cannot be "cute" by placing the additional term in a separate writing, verbal agreement, or course of doing business: it is an additional term no-matter how you memorialize it (or even if you choose not to memorialize it).
And yes: IAAL.
"You may not restrict their rights, but that's not what GrSecurity is doing."
Yes it is. GrSecurity is assessing a penalty for the exercise of a explicitly permitted action. It is a restriction and a violation of the license grant.
Argue all you want. You are simply wrong.
The GPLv2 forbids the imposition of additional restrictive terms. GRSecurity imposed an additional restrictive term. No you cannot be "cute" by placing the additional term in a separate writing, verbal agreement, or course of doing business: it is an additional term no-matter how you memorialize it (or even if you choose not to memorialize it).
And yes: IAAL.
"You may not restrict their rights, but that's not what GrSecurity is doing."
Yes it is. GrSecurity is assessing a penalty for the exercise of a explicitly permitted action. It is a restriction and a violation of the license grant.
Argue all you want. You are simply wrong
"You may not impose any further restrictions on the recipients' exercise of the rights granted herein"
GPLv2 forbids additional restrictive terms added to the agreement between the licencee and those to whom the licensee distributes the work (or derivative work). (distributees)
Terms can be memorialized or not. They can be verbal, be evinced by a course of business dealings, or be in a writing.
Here the additional terms added to the agreement were in a writing (they are memorialized).
The writing even outlines various penalties to be assessed if the client makes use of the rights granted by the original grantor vs the newly added restriction by GRSecurity / Brad Spengler!
"I'm sorry, Bruce, but are you referring to that nonsen"
Hey, shlub, who's case is going before the 9th circuit and who's is not?
I think Bruce has superior lawyers than the likes of you.
Hopefully they'll argue there about the root of this case, like Brad Spengler lawyer wants.
It is sad that kernel developers do not protect their intellectual property interests; of-course what else can be expected from grass-eaters?
"You may not impose any further restrictions on the recipients' exercise of the rights granted herein"
GPLv2 forbids additional restrictive terms added to the agreement between the licencee and those to whom the licensee distributes the work (or derivative work). (distributees)
Terms can be memorialized or not. They can be verbal, be evinced by a course of business dealings, or be in a writing.
Here the additional terms added to the agreement were in a writing (they are memorialized)..
The writing even outlines various penalties to be assessed if the client makes use of the rights granted by the original grantor vs the newly added restriction by GRSecurity / Brad Spengler!
https://perens.com/2017/06/28/...
Posted on June 28, 2017 by Bruce
Warning: Grsecurity: Potential contributory infringement and breach of contract risk for customers
Itâ(TM)s my strong opinion that your company should avoid the Grsecurity product sold at grsecurity.net because it presents a contributory infringement and breach of contract risk.
Grsecurity is a patch for the Linux kernel which, it is claimed, improves its security. It is a derivative work of the Linux kernel which touches the kernel internals in many different places. It is inseparable from Linux and can not work without it. it would fail a fair-use test (obviously, ask offline if you donâ(TM)t understand). 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.
Currently, Grsecurity is a commercial product and is distributed only to paying customers. Under their Stable Patch Access Agreement, customers are 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.
By operating under their policy of terminating customer relations upon distribution of their GPL-licensed software, Open Source Security Inc., the owner of Grsecurity, creates an expectation that the customerâ(TM)s business will be damaged by losing access to support and later versions of the product, if that customer exercises their re-distribution right under the GPL license. Grsecurityâ(TM)s Stable Patch Access Agreement adds 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 GPL does not apply when Grsecurity first ships the work to the customer, and thus the customer has paid for an unlicensed infringing derivative work of the Linux kernel developers with all rights reserved. The contract from the Linux kernel developers to both Grsecurity and the customer which is inherent in the GPL is breached.
As a customer, itâ(TM)s my opinion that you would be subject to both contributory infringement and breach of contract by employing this product in conjunction with the Linux kernel under the no-redistribution policy currently employed by Grsecurity.
I have previously endorsed a company that distributes enhanced versions of GPL software to paying customers, but that company operated differently (and in a way that I would recommend to Grsecurity). They did not make any threat to customers regarding redistribution. They publicly distributed their commercial version within 9 months to one year after its customer-only distribution.
This other company was essentially receiving payment from its customers for the work of making new GPL software available to the public after a relatively short delay, and thus they were doing a public benefit and were, IMO, in compliance with the letter of GPL though perhaps not the spirit. In contrast, Grsecurity does no redeeming public service, and does not allow any redistribution of their Linux derivative, in direct contravention to the GPL terms.
In the public interest, I am willing to discuss this issue with companies and their legal counsel, under NDA, without charge.
I am an intellectual property and technology specialist who advises attorneys, not an attorney. This is my opinion and is offered as advice to your attorney. Please show this to him or her. Under the law of most states, your attorney who is contracted to you is the only party who can provide you with legal advice.
The GPLv2 does not impose any obligation to provide current, much less future support, to distributed code.
The GRSecurity "separate writing" only terminates an obligation to provide future support (updates and source code to update) if the source code is disclosed.
Ego, it is not an "additional restrictive term" under the GPL.
It is you who is simply wrong.
Not yours. Potentially because you can't distinguish between a contraction (who's) and a possessive (whose).
And I think that a monkey could have beaten that SLAPP suit, which did not rule on whether there actually was any GPLv2 violation or not.
9 months running says that it doesn't happen. Plus Bruce lacks standing to sue.