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User: Mbaumgartner

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  1. Re:Proprietary Linux on Torvalds Explains Dislike For GPLv3 · · Score: 1

    This isn't going to happen. The reason Linux etc took off as a popular server OS was because they were open.

    Some people want to use Linux because they can modify it, if you take that ability away, then everyone who bought it because they can modify it would flat out not buy from you. There always has been, and always will be choices on hardware makers. If Dell started doing that, don't buy a dell.

    The reason this won't happen for servers is because most server sales go to people with IT who want the ability to modify the living crap out of their OS.

    The reason this won't happen on desktops is because for $60 plus parts your friend's son's roommate will make you a desktop with a free OS.

    This has all been tried before and failed. The sky is going to fall if we don't get some god damn load bearing licenses! This argument of freedoms being plowed into the ground are pretty weak because there is so much history of companies trying and failing at this. If this kind of hardware lock-in crap worked, Apple would be where Microsoft is right now.

    This is also a very far cry from being MS'esqe.

    But guess what, if it ever did come to that...Linus could say "oh ok, i'll upgrade to gpl 3".

    In the end though there are only two stances on DRM for this debate. Either you're cool with other people using their hardware to enforce using software that has been approved, or you aren't. Linus obviously hasn't got any problems with TiVo like systems using Linux without allowing you to modify it on their hardware. The reason he likes GPL2 is because it forces you to share. If TiVo made some groundbreaking changes, then it's open source and everyone gets to use those changes, and Linux is better because of it. There are good reasons for it too. If I were making a specialty hardware device I wouldn't want people going in and tinkering with it, then whining to me about it not working because they decided to hack it. GPL3 dRM controls are just flat out bad for making money off OS products

    Stallman did a good thing by releasing GPL3 with the DRM sections though. I don't think the "crusader" analogy is really correct, I think it's a matter of preference. Now people can choose. It seems to me that Linus considers the FSF's position to be more in line with social views on freedom, and less in line with his own views on how to improve software development.