> Imagine instead the code had a typical public-domain header ("you may use this code for any purpose, provided that..."). You are claiming that this text is meaningless, and that if I released public-domain code, I could still sue somebody who makes a copy of that code.
Absolutely. Whether you'd win or not depends on whether you explicitely specified "unrevokable and in perpetuity", on how you handle the cease-and-desist, and on how you argue the court case. You could send a cease and desist explicitely nullifying the license and reclaiming your rights. The license didn't form a contract, and you received nothing (directly) in return for granting rights to duplicate. The recipient has had a free ride. Why did they have an expectation that it would be in perpetuity? (you would argue)
> If what you are saying is true, then all code that does not involve a signed contract (ie public-domain, BSD, GPL, and all open source licenses, all code samples in books, and all commercial programming libraries) are suddenly unsafe to use.
Yes. They are unsafe to use, which is why my company runs every use of such code past a specialist IP lawyer, and we don't do that often. We do this because the company is set up to be sold, and the value of the company is the code base. Any code that we don't have full rights to is worthless to us.
We actually entered into a discussion with a third party developer to see if we could pay him for a license for a GPL tool he had written. He declined, telling us that we were fine to use it as it was, and that he had no intention of revoking the license. He was confused by the suggestion that he could do this, and he hadn't even considered the possibility that at some point he might sell the rights to his copyrighted code to a third party who would try and revoke it and exploit the user base (yes, much as SCO have done).
I'm not saying that SCO will win, just that it is exactly the situation that RMS has been warning about for years. Commercial companies that rely on implicitely licensed code should be watching this case very, very closely. Even if SCO screw the pooch, other observers will be taking notes. Think Microsoft. Think Microsoft buying out SCO entirely and then starting with the little fish rather than going after IBM. Think Microsoft buying out Red Hat and all their "defensive" patents.
Ultimately, you get what you pay for. Specifically, you get what you can prove that you contracted to buy. Anything else is a loan.
Just to clear up some of the bigger misconceptions out there.
"Distributing under the GPL" means exactly and only placing GPL license text in your source. The act of doing so isn't the same as meaning it.
You can't sue someone for "infringing the GPL". The GPL isn't a law. You sue someone for infringing your copyright. You can do that if anyone distributes your copyrighted and GPL licensed code regardless of whether they are retaining GPL licenses and attaching them to their modifications. The GPL just gives them their defence. But it's not a contract, and it grants no clear or unarguable protection.
If you sue people for violating your copyrights despite attaching GPL license text to your source, that does not clearly disallow you from using the GPL defence against me if I sue you for duplicating my copyrighted source. Confused? Read the GPL. The GPL self destructs if you "copy, modify, sublicense, or distribute the Program except as expressly provided under this License". Suing a third party for violating your copyright (after you've stopped distributing my copyrighted source) isn't covered.
There is no clause in the GPL that requires anyone to license their code in perpetuity. All it says is that if you distribute my code with a GPL license attached, I indicate that I agree not to sue you for performing that duplication. The instant that you stop duplicating my copyrighted source, I have no leverage over you.
The same applies in spades to patents. There is no clause in the GPL that requires you to grant licenses for your patents, either while distributing or in perpetuity. All it says is that if you pursue your patents while duplicating my copyrighted source, you have no right not to be sued. Again though, once the duplication stops, you can go hog wild pursuing your patent claims.
We all need to take a deep breath and realise that there is a serious threat here. You may think that the GPL gives you unbreakable rights in perpetuity. You'd be wrong. Read it. Try and find the clauses. They aren't there.
The problem that SCO has is that they may still be duplicating other people's copyrighted code. Doing so while prosecuting patent rights removes the protection that the GPL gives them from being sued, so get your suits in now. But heck, the GPL is only a gentleman's agreement anyway. It doesn't have the force of law, nor is it a contract. You can sue anyone for duplicating your code regardess of whether you attached a GPL license to it or not, arguing that it didn't form a contract, or that it's revokable because it doesn't grant rights in perpetuity.
This isn't black and white. SCO have left themselves liable to being sued, but that doesn't mean that they invalidate their right to sue others for duplicating their copyrighted source. The only winners here will be the lawyers. And no, I'm not one, but I've paid enough to them to accept that the GPL is a huge mess (because it doesn't mandate unrevokable and in perpetuity) and that this was an inevitable situation sooner or later.
Nearly. You can't "violate" the GPL, nor can you "infringe" it per se. You can only infringe copyright. Distributing under the GPL just means attaching a GPL license to the source. Note that the action of doing that (demonstrably) isn't the same as the intention of following it. You don't have to mean it, and the license is only as binding as the copyright owners force it to be.
> The GPL specifically states that if you ship the code, the GPL applies, and that if you ship your proprietary IP it has to be available for a royalty free non-terminable licence.
Does it really? Care to quote the parts that say that?
What it actually says is that the only thing that gives you the ongoing right to duplicate other people's IP is to ship with the GPL license attached. It doesn't say that you have to mean it, nor that you can't stop shipping (thereby stopping your own violation of other peoples' rights, and SCO are slowly getting there) and then renege on your GPL license and prosecute the duplication and distribution of your copyrighted code.
Regarding patents, again all that the GPL says is that you can't distribute other people's copyrighted source at the same time as you're attaching patent claims. Once you stop shipping (which SCO will by the time this gets heard in court, I assume) you can go hog wild.
The GPL does not require you to grant explicit licenses to your patents, either on an ongoing basis or in perpetuity. This is the big snafu in version 2, and one which is long overdue for change.
If you disagree, quote the clauses. I say they're not there.
>Only if they used the written offer option, as opposed to providing the source with the original binaries (and providing it for download at the time of downloading the binaries is good enough I seem to recall
Depends on the interpretation of "accompanying" ("Accompany it with the complete corresponding machine-readable source code"). I'd interpret that as meaning bundled into a single tar rather than just available (which is clause b). IANAL, and more importantly I haven't asked a lawyer to look at this specific clause of the GPL.
You can't find the clause because it's not there. Can you quote it? No, so please stop talking out of your arse lest the more exitable slashbots believe you rather than taking the time to read it themselves.
> the GPL has a clause that says breaking the GPL is grounds for losing your license to the GPL;
Quote that clause. It's not there. All the GPL version 2 talks about is ongoing conditions, not conditions in perpetuity, which is one of its big problems.
>according to the terms of the GNU General Public License, if you can't satisfy patent laws AND the terms of the GPL simulataneously you have no right to use the code at all.
How about you read the license rather than expecting to be spoon fed the answer?
That said, I need the practice. Open wide! Here comes the choo choo train!
3. You may copy and distribute the Program (or a work based on it, under Section 2) in object code or executable form under the terms of Sections 1 and 2 above provided that you also do one of the following:
a) Accompany it with the complete corresponding machine-readable source code, which must be distributed under the terms of Sections 1 and 2 above on a medium customarily used for software interchange; or,
b) Accompany it with a written offer, valid for at least three years, to give any third party, for a charge no more than your cost of physically performing source distribution, a complete machine-readable copy of the corresponding source code, to be distributed under the terms of Sections 1 and 2 above on a medium customarily used for software interchange; or,
c) Accompany it with the information you received as to the offer to distribute corresponding source code. (This alternative is allowed only for noncommercial distribution and only if you received the program in object code or executable form with such an offer, in accord with Subsection b above.)
Well said. I spend enough time doing unpaid tech Windoze support for friends and family. I shudder to think how bad it would be if they ran lunix. Next time someone begs an install off of me, I'm telling them to buy a Mac, because:
A: It's only got one button, and Mac presses it before it leaves the factory.
B: I know jack shit about them, so I won't have to waste my life saying "click start, setting, control panel, system..." down a 'phone ten times a week.
Should be the last words to come out of a judge's mouth before they are barred (or is that debarred?) from the bench.
Congress shall make no law abridging freedom of speech isn't a suggestion, it's an edict. There's no "unless it's to protect the children or to fight bad men or to save puppies". There is no conflicting clause, nothing to balance this against. Congress shall make no law..
Go on, someone explain how the Bill of Rights and separation of powers prevents political abuse. I need a good laugh after this farce.
Preach it. Fossil fuels are a one off bonanza. It is astonishingly hard to conceive of a world without them, or to consider the possibility that alternatives (other than nuclear) are net energy losers. Sure, a solar plant can now power itself. It can even power the extraction of the raw materials. Can it power the homes of its workers? Can it power their vehicles on the way to work? Can it power their leisure activities? Simply, can it power the level of infrastructure required to maintain it (and to build other plants)?
Maybe we can get to that level. In the meantime, plant some trees.
The fools! You don't go into space because it's hard, you go because it's profitable. They're living in the 1960's, I tell you!
Meanwhile, back in the USA, we debate whether we'll even be able to make a decision on what to begin replacing the low earth orbitter fleet with before they all rust apart in 20 years. I'm betting we won't (make the decision, replace them, your choice).
As a further random thought, perhaps if we spent more looking beyond low earth orbit, we wouldn't have to spend quite as much on putting inward facing weapons systems up there.
Hands up any of these meat puppets who chose not to sell all rights to the work that the labels wrote and produced for them to those labels. Any one? Any one at all?
I'll start caring when actual artists rather than sock puppets start whining.
Please note, this is a civil action, not a criminal prosecution. The standard of evidence required is "balance of probability", not "beyond all reasonable doubt".
If you are running a service on your machine that is responding to a file sharing protocol and choosing to advertise that you have a 5MB file called Metallica-Enter-Sandman.mp3, what is the balance of probability. Is it more probable that this is a copy of that song that you are offering to make further copies of, or is it more probable that it's your 2 million word magnus opus that you just happen to have given that name?
OK, no doubt you (dear reader) consider yourself a special case. No doubt you deliberately keep piles of misnamed files around, or perhaps just have a hacked client that responds to any searches with "Sure, here it is", just to troll the RIAA. Fine, keep telling yourself that a court will believe you. But look at it another way; if files like that were on 100 Joe Filesharers' hard drives, how many of them would you expect to be copies of copyrighted songs, and how many renamed benign or random content? 1? 5? 10?
If it's fewer than 50 (and it is, if we're being honest) then the balance of probability is that any given file found advertised on a filesharing network does exist, is the content that it says that it is, and is available for duplication in violation of copyright law.
That's all that the RIAA have to show. They don't need to send in the Gestapo to kick down your door and sieze your machine (although they will if they can). They just have to convince a court that you probably duplicated content in violation of copyright law.
Thank you for your attention. Normal service of shrieking about first amendments and absolute proof may now resume.
Did you not read the above? It's not criminal conduct, it's civil tort. In a civil case, the burden of proof is "balance of probability", not "beyond all reasonable doubt".
If you have an mp3 with the name of a copyrighted song, and an appropriate size to be a copy of that song, what is the balance of probability? Is it more likely that it's the song, or more likely that it's something else? Or, put another way, if you found files like this on 100 individual's hard drives, how many of them would you expect to be innocent renamed files? 1? 5? 10? If it's fewer than 50, the balance of probability is that any given file like this is a copy of a song.
Oh dear. Please quote the part of the GPL that requires explicit patent licensing in perpetuity. It does not even require you to grant explicit licenses for patents, despite claiming to do so in the preamble. It just says that you can't enforce licensing at the same time as you are distributing under the GPL.
There is nothing in the GPL that stops submarine patents being enforced in future. If you think otherwise, talk to a specialist IP lawyer. The FSF goofed and goofed big time with this. I believe that they are now afraid of clearing this up in a new version of the GPL because it would expose the long standing snafu in version 2. They're hoping that FUD - or better, case law - will lead to an "explicitely and in perpetuity" interpretation of version 2. SCO clearly thinks otherwise.
IANAL, but when I've paid one (several, actually) to advise me, I listen to what I'm told, not what I want to hear.
98% of House incumbents get reelected. He could suggest a bill in favor of allowing Mickey Mouse to come round and assrape your kids (physically rather than just financially), and it wouldn't matter, because as far as Joe America is concerned, it's better the devil you know from his reelection compaign than the devil you don't.
Hatch will keep in his seat until they scrape his festering corpse out of it. Or perhaps a bit longer, depending on whether his corpse's reelection campaign has already been funded by the *AA.
Slashdot Mirror
> Imagine instead the code had a typical public-domain header ("you may use this code for any purpose, provided that..."). You are claiming that this text is meaningless, and that if I released public-domain code, I could still sue somebody who makes a copy of that code.
Absolutely. Whether you'd win or not depends on whether you explicitely specified "unrevokable and in perpetuity", on how you handle the cease-and-desist, and on how you argue the court case. You could send a cease and desist explicitely nullifying the license and reclaiming your rights. The license didn't form a contract, and you received nothing (directly) in return for granting rights to duplicate. The recipient has had a free ride. Why did they have an expectation that it would be in perpetuity? (you would argue)
> If what you are saying is true, then all code that does not involve a signed contract (ie public-domain, BSD, GPL, and all open source licenses, all code samples in books, and all commercial programming libraries) are suddenly unsafe to use.
Yes. They are unsafe to use, which is why my company runs every use of such code past a specialist IP lawyer, and we don't do that often. We do this because the company is set up to be sold, and the value of the company is the code base. Any code that we don't have full rights to is worthless to us.
We actually entered into a discussion with a third party developer to see if we could pay him for a license for a GPL tool he had written. He declined, telling us that we were fine to use it as it was, and that he had no intention of revoking the license. He was confused by the suggestion that he could do this, and he hadn't even considered the possibility that at some point he might sell the rights to his copyrighted code to a third party who would try and revoke it and exploit the user base (yes, much as SCO have done).
I'm not saying that SCO will win, just that it is exactly the situation that RMS has been warning about for years. Commercial companies that rely on implicitely licensed code should be watching this case very, very closely. Even if SCO screw the pooch, other observers will be taking notes. Think Microsoft. Think Microsoft buying out SCO entirely and then starting with the little fish rather than going after IBM. Think Microsoft buying out Red Hat and all their "defensive" patents.
Ultimately, you get what you pay for. Specifically, you get what you can prove that you contracted to buy. Anything else is a loan.
And you can quote this, can you? Can you, you shrieking lickspittle? Go on, shut me up by quoting it. I'm waiting.
We all need to take a deep breath and realise that there is a serious threat here. You may think that the GPL gives you unbreakable rights in perpetuity. You'd be wrong. Read it. Try and find the clauses. They aren't there.
The problem that SCO has is that they may still be duplicating other people's copyrighted code. Doing so while prosecuting patent rights removes the protection that the GPL gives them from being sued, so get your suits in now. But heck, the GPL is only a gentleman's agreement anyway. It doesn't have the force of law, nor is it a contract. You can sue anyone for duplicating your code regardess of whether you attached a GPL license to it or not, arguing that it didn't form a contract, or that it's revokable because it doesn't grant rights in perpetuity.
This isn't black and white. SCO have left themselves liable to being sued, but that doesn't mean that they invalidate their right to sue others for duplicating their copyrighted source. The only winners here will be the lawyers. And no, I'm not one, but I've paid enough to them to accept that the GPL is a huge mess (because it doesn't mandate unrevokable and in perpetuity) and that this was an inevitable situation sooner or later.
Nearly. You can't "violate" the GPL, nor can you "infringe" it per se. You can only infringe copyright. Distributing under the GPL just means attaching a GPL license to the source. Note that the action of doing that (demonstrably) isn't the same as the intention of following it. You don't have to mean it, and the license is only as binding as the copyright owners force it to be.
> The GPL specifically states that if you ship the code, the GPL applies, and that if you ship your proprietary IP it has to be available for a royalty free non-terminable licence.
Does it really? Care to quote the parts that say that?
What it actually says is that the only thing that gives you the ongoing right to duplicate other people's IP is to ship with the GPL license attached. It doesn't say that you have to mean it, nor that you can't stop shipping (thereby stopping your own violation of other peoples' rights, and SCO are slowly getting there) and then renege on your GPL license and prosecute the duplication and distribution of your copyrighted code.
Regarding patents, again all that the GPL says is that you can't distribute other people's copyrighted source at the same time as you're attaching patent claims. Once you stop shipping (which SCO will by the time this gets heard in court, I assume) you can go hog wild.
The GPL does not require you to grant explicit licenses to your patents, either on an ongoing basis or in perpetuity. This is the big snafu in version 2, and one which is long overdue for change.
If you disagree, quote the clauses. I say they're not there.
I think you miss the point. To sell stock you have to find someone willing to buy it. Any informed speculator will be avoiding SCO like the plague.
Fortunately for SCO, informed speculators are pretty thin on the ground. There's always a chump ready to take the risk.
>Only if they used the written offer option, as opposed to providing the source with the original binaries (and providing it for download at the time of downloading the binaries is good enough I seem to recall
Depends on the interpretation of "accompanying" ("Accompany it with the complete corresponding machine-readable source code"). I'd interpret that as meaning bundled into a single tar rather than just available (which is clause b). IANAL, and more importantly I haven't asked a lawyer to look at this specific clause of the GPL.
You can't find the clause because it's not there. Can you quote it? No, so please stop talking out of your arse lest the more exitable slashbots believe you rather than taking the time to read it themselves.
> the GPL has a clause that says breaking the GPL is grounds for losing your license to the GPL;
Quote that clause. It's not there. All the GPL version 2 talks about is ongoing conditions, not conditions in perpetuity, which is one of its big problems.
>according to the terms of the GNU General Public License, if you can't satisfy patent laws AND the terms of the GPL simulataneously you have no right to use the code at all.
s/use/distribute/
YA definitely NAL
How about you read the license rather than expecting to be spoon fed the answer?
That said, I need the practice. Open wide! Here comes the choo choo train!
3. You may copy and distribute the Program (or a work based on it, under Section 2) in object code or executable form under the terms of Sections 1 and 2 above provided that you also do one of the following:
a) Accompany it with the complete corresponding machine-readable source code, which must be distributed under the terms of Sections 1 and 2 above on a medium customarily used for software interchange; or,
b) Accompany it with a written offer, valid for at least three years, to give any third party, for a charge no more than your cost of physically performing source distribution, a complete machine-readable copy of the corresponding source code, to be distributed under the terms of Sections 1 and 2 above on a medium customarily used for software interchange; or,
c) Accompany it with the information you received as to the offer to distribute corresponding source code. (This alternative is allowed only for noncommercial distribution and only if you received the program in object code or executable form with such an offer, in accord with Subsection b above.)
Now, would you like me to wipe your arse for you?
Well said. I spend enough time doing unpaid tech Windoze support for friends and family. I shudder to think how bad it would be if they ran lunix. Next time someone begs an install off of me, I'm telling them to buy a Mac, because:
A: It's only got one button, and Mac presses it before it leaves the factory.
B: I know jack shit about them, so I won't have to waste my life saying "click start, setting, control panel, system..." down a 'phone ten times a week.
Should be the last words to come out of a judge's mouth before they are barred (or is that debarred?) from the bench.
Congress shall make no law abridging freedom of speech isn't a suggestion, it's an edict. There's no "unless it's to protect the children or to fight bad men or to save puppies". There is no conflicting clause, nothing to balance this against. Congress shall make no law..
Go on, someone explain how the Bill of Rights and separation of powers prevents political abuse. I need a good laugh after this farce.
Preach it. Fossil fuels are a one off bonanza. It is astonishingly hard to conceive of a world without them, or to consider the possibility that alternatives (other than nuclear) are net energy losers. Sure, a solar plant can now power itself. It can even power the extraction of the raw materials. Can it power the homes of its workers? Can it power their vehicles on the way to work? Can it power their leisure activities? Simply, can it power the level of infrastructure required to maintain it (and to build other plants)?
Maybe we can get to that level. In the meantime, plant some trees.
SMACK! Why are you suing yourself? SMACK! Why are you suing yourself?
The fools! You don't go into space because it's hard, you go because it's profitable. They're living in the 1960's, I tell you!
Meanwhile, back in the USA, we debate whether we'll even be able to make a decision on what to begin replacing the low earth orbitter fleet with before they all rust apart in 20 years. I'm betting we won't (make the decision, replace them, your choice).
As a further random thought, perhaps if we spent more looking beyond low earth orbit, we wouldn't have to spend quite as much on putting inward facing weapons systems up there.
You either win utterly and completely, or you become their bitch for life.
Don't compromise. Don't cut deals. Don't back down. You really have very little to lose by fighting it every step of the way.
Thanks for making that clear, RIAA. So noted.
Hands up any of these meat puppets who chose not to sell all rights to the work that the labels wrote and produced for them to those labels. Any one? Any one at all?
I'll start caring when actual artists rather than sock puppets start whining.
Please note, this is a civil action, not a criminal prosecution. The standard of evidence required is "balance of probability", not "beyond all reasonable doubt".
If you are running a service on your machine that is responding to a file sharing protocol and choosing to advertise that you have a 5MB file called Metallica-Enter-Sandman.mp3, what is the balance of probability. Is it more probable that this is a copy of that song that you are offering to make further copies of, or is it more probable that it's your 2 million word magnus opus that you just happen to have given that name?
OK, no doubt you (dear reader) consider yourself a special case. No doubt you deliberately keep piles of misnamed files around, or perhaps just have a hacked client that responds to any searches with "Sure, here it is", just to troll the RIAA. Fine, keep telling yourself that a court will believe you. But look at it another way; if files like that were on 100 Joe Filesharers' hard drives, how many of them would you expect to be copies of copyrighted songs, and how many renamed benign or random content? 1? 5? 10?
If it's fewer than 50 (and it is, if we're being honest) then the balance of probability is that any given file found advertised on a filesharing network does exist, is the content that it says that it is, and is available for duplication in violation of copyright law.
That's all that the RIAA have to show. They don't need to send in the Gestapo to kick down your door and sieze your machine (although they will if they can). They just have to convince a court that you probably duplicated content in violation of copyright law.
Thank you for your attention. Normal service of shrieking about first amendments and absolute proof may now resume.
Did you not read the above? It's not criminal conduct, it's civil tort. In a civil case, the burden of proof is "balance of probability", not "beyond all reasonable doubt".
If you have an mp3 with the name of a copyrighted song, and an appropriate size to be a copy of that song, what is the balance of probability? Is it more likely that it's the song, or more likely that it's something else? Or, put another way, if you found files like this on 100 individual's hard drives, how many of them would you expect to be innocent renamed files? 1? 5? 10? If it's fewer than 50, the balance of probability is that any given file like this is a copy of a song.
Is that making sense yet?
Yoo peeple ar dummer than skwirruls. Reely.
Oh dear. Please quote the part of the GPL that requires explicit patent licensing in perpetuity. It does not even require you to grant explicit licenses for patents, despite claiming to do so in the preamble. It just says that you can't enforce licensing at the same time as you are distributing under the GPL.
There is nothing in the GPL that stops submarine patents being enforced in future. If you think otherwise, talk to a specialist IP lawyer. The FSF goofed and goofed big time with this. I believe that they are now afraid of clearing this up in a new version of the GPL because it would expose the long standing snafu in version 2. They're hoping that FUD - or better, case law - will lead to an "explicitely and in perpetuity" interpretation of version 2. SCO clearly thinks otherwise.
IANAL, but when I've paid one (several, actually) to advise me, I listen to what I'm told, not what I want to hear.
98% of House incumbents get reelected. He could suggest a bill in favor of allowing Mickey Mouse to come round and assrape your kids (physically rather than just financially), and it wouldn't matter, because as far as Joe America is concerned, it's better the devil you know from his reelection compaign than the devil you don't.
Hatch will keep in his seat until they scrape his festering corpse out of it. Or perhaps a bit longer, depending on whether his corpse's reelection campaign has already been funded by the *AA.
All that really matters is: is she going to show some cleavage?
All your code base are belong to us.