Seminar On Details Of The GPL And Related Licenses 171
bkuhn writes "Given the recent confusion about LGPL on slashdot, and the concern it
raised for those convincing corporate legal departments to adopt to Free
Software, perhaps your readers might be interested in FSF's legal seminar on
the GPL and related licenses. The first one is in Silicon Valley, and
if it is successful, we hope to hold others in the next 8 months in New
York City and Tokyo." Since the FSF and the GNU project have long created and fought for software that's shareable, Free, and Not UNIX, what's taught at these seminars will probably differ sharply from what you can hear at next Monday's SCO conference call on the "IBM lawsuit, UNIX Ownership and Copyrights."
Erm, Timothy?? (Score:5, Insightful)
Lets see, GPL, GNU not UNIX, so lets mention SCO? Where the hell is the logic, just seems like you wanted to post a link that might cause a little slashdotting to SCO's site. One might infer this as particularly malicious.
SCO has never once said anything against the GNU, in fact the GNU actually semi-support the SCO standpoint, if code was not given by the author than it violated the codes original copyright.
I do believe making this thread appaling to the commentors because of a mention to SCO is pretty tasteless and definantelly offtopic.
KISS (Score:3, Insightful)
The BSD license is pretty simple. And it's equally simple to rule out for-profit use of your code, if that's your beef.
The complexities of the GPL stem from its attempt to be "viral" and enforce the FSF's philosophy on other people. It's easier just to stay away from it altogether than to fuss about with all the niggling details. If you have nothing to do with GPL code, then it's easy to be sure you're not violating the license terms.
Unfortunately, this tends to cause harm to OSS in general, as many people just slap the GPL on their code because it's a popular "free" license, without really understanding or considering the consequence. And thus, it becomes easier "just to stay away from" lots of OSS code that might otherwise get used in more contexts were the license less murky -- or if another license altogether became popular.
Oh, please (Score:4, Insightful)
Please spare us the editorial comment. In yesterday's [slashdot.org] article, Dave Turner specifically bemoaned the fact that CowboyNeal had not double-checked [slashdot.org] his facts and just went ahead and posted. The story submitter then apologized [slashdot.org] to Dave for going "sensational", which is apparently the only way to get a story through the "editors" nowadays, with the exception of anything that remotely smells of "M$" or the RIAA.
So I think an apology to the FSF (and your readers) is in order.
We call it "hereditary" (Score:4, Insightful)
How can a voluntarily adopted license "force" anybody? As you say, you just have to reject the use of GPLed software if you don't like it. And remember that the GPL must only be accepted if you redistribute another's program, not just if you use it. A programmer should be aware of the terms in which the code she relies upon is licensed, right?
The whole point of the GPL is to build a community of people freely sharing code and donating it to each other. The license is tuned and tweaked to do just that, and do it really well.
If someone want to use the GPL for a different purpose (like, say, earning some money), hey, the code it's free! They can do it, but they should be very aware that the license is not intended to do that. So, it's not the FSF fault if they got it wrong, as their goals are cristal clear [gnu.org].
Re:US vs. Iraq - Software Business vs. FSF communi (Score:1, Insightful)
Nobody promised quality products for free (as in price), not even the FSF. If you don't support the developers of free software, you won't get quality software.
Re:Never could understand (Score:5, Insightful)
a) The references to derivative works - what exactly is a derivative work? How can you tell?
b) The meaning of redistribution.
The whole Java/LGPL thing was a storm in a teacup caused by people who didn't understand the wording or the spirit of the license.
I sometimes wonder if it's due to the nature of the people involved. Programming is sometimes an sexact and inflexible science - literality is important. The law on the other hand is anything but those things.
So, for instance, I've seen people wrangle and argue over exactly what is and isn't linking, without realising that this is beside the point - the LGPL is very clear that if you use the code in your program, the user should be able to drop in a replacement they compiled themselves - otherwise, what is the point of having the source (for the user) if they are powerless to use it to improve their own apps? In standard C or C++ apps, static linking prevents the user from doing that, so you can't do it (or rather, you must offer a version that uses dynamic linkage). In Java, all linkage is dynamic, so as long as the user can drop in a new jarfile, or set of classes, you're set. In Python etc, you're almost always compliant even if you embed the code direct into the source files, because the user can still go in an edit those parts. At least, that's *my* interpretation.
Likewise, I've seen people say you can't link GPLd code with anything other than a GPLd program - also rubbish. Any GPL compatible license will do.
Basically people forget that licenses are agreements between the author of the code, and themselves. The author expresses their wishes for how the code can be used, and you must abide by those wishes. The GPL/LGPL/BSD and so on are just useful boilerplates to save people reinventing the wheel. You can always ask the copyright holder to grant you a commercial license if you want to use some GPLd code - they may so no, but also they may not.
Re:(L)GPL advocates please read (Score:3, Insightful)
I will agree with you that the previous poster was spouting metaphysical bullshit. But you are making the mistake of confusing freedom with privilege.
Privilege belongs to a few, freedom belongs to everyone. There is no such think as the freedom to take away the freedoms of others. You are confusing this with the privilege of taking away the freedoms (or privileges) of others. Please understand the difference.
Freedom is based upon the respect of property (with 'self' included as a property). I am free to do whatever I want with my own property, within my own domain. But I am not free to do anything at all to your property within your domain without getting your permission first. The reason my freedom to swing my fist ends at your nose, is because your nose is not my property to do with as I wish. The reason I cannot yell "fire" in a crowded theater is because that endangers the property (lives) of others.
Everyone has (or should have) the freedom to do whatever they want with their own software that they have written. But when you start dealing with the software that other people have written, then the firm respect for property is critically important to preserve freedom. The BSD license is free because it recognizes this. It says "this is my property, do with it as you wish." The GPL is free because it says "this is my property, and you can use it if you follow my rules". The biggest difference between the two licenses is that the GPL strenously asserts its property rights over the work and its derivatives, while the BSD license absolves all but the most trivial property rights over the work and its derivatives.
If you like the GPL, then proudly assert that you are in favor of strong copyrights and software ownership, and people may only use your property in according with your demands. But don't go asserting that other licenses are less free just because they don't wave the legal cudgel of copyright in everyone's faces.
Re:We call it "hereditary" (Score:5, Insightful)
There are good arguments to use the GPL, even for business-minded folks who disagree with RMS's idea that all software must be free.
The GPL is quite usable for making money. Consider TrollTech, the providers of QT. Their use of the GPL/QPL combo (though the GPL alone would work just as well) got the product of a small Norwegian company known all over the world, and the fact that proprietary developers don't like the GPL means that Troll Tech can sell developer licenses at significant cost.
BSD fans who accuse GPL fans of communism have it backwards: giving work away completely for any purpose, from each according to his ability, to each according to his need, is a hallmark of the BSD license. As Russ Nelson (of OSI) has said, "When I write proprietary software I expect to get paid". By choosing the GPL instead of a non-copyleft license, the author is in a sense insisting on compensation for his work, either in the form of changes that get contributed back, or with the possibility of selling someone a license to use terms other than the GPL.
What might really harm the BSD folks is the growing practice by holders of software patents to license those patents for use in GPL code, but not in non-copylefted code. IBM is doing a lot of this: they've made some of their patents available to both the Linux kernel and GCC. I would prefer to see no patents at all, but don't see a way of letting the BSD folks use the patents without effectively giving the patent away to all. They could say, OK, BSD folks, use of the patent is OK as long as full source is provided for the whole app, but did you notice that these conditions are effectively a copyleft, like the GPL (if you use it you have to give the whole source away)?
Re:Choosing a license to release company-owned cod (Score:1, Insightful)
If you don't give a shit what happens to your code, use the BSD license. You might see your code on the shelf at the local software store though, with a restrictive EULA and a $5,000 price tag.
If you REALLY don't give a shit, put it in the public domain. Same deal as above.
If you want to give out your code, but you want to be sure that the software isn't commercialized by someone ELSE and the changes kept secret, use the GPL. If you choose the GPL, you might have to spend a little more time keeping your eye out for violations.
That's it. BSD, GPL, public domain. Everything else is a hybrid or variation. You can also dual-license with another license but I really recommend sticking with those three choices. I personally use GPL for everything unless it's small, then I just use public domain.
For many clients, I don't give them any license to copy the software AT ALL. This means they can use the copy I put on their computer, but not copy it. Some of them insist on having a license anyway because of the BS that microsoft, et al, have been feeding us for all these years. So I just write on a piece of paper "you can use the software but not copy it".
Whatever you do, please don't just "make up" a license like IBM, Mozilla, Apache, etc., please stick with an existing license. There are a lot of subtleties here. It's not that tough.
Re:US vs. Iraq - Software Business vs. FSF communi (Score:1, Insightful)
if you license your software under GPL, can you do anything you want with it? No!
I don't know the point of your post (you're encouraged that folks are critical of the Free Software Foundation? Why? So the OSS community can come apart from the inside instead of having Microsoft try to destroy it?) (And what's the deal with comparing Iraq and Communism to the FSF? Comparing the destruction of human lives to a license you don't like is a little over the top.)
But I have to correct you here. If you license your code under the GPL, you can still do whatever you want with YOUR code. Don't give the GPL magic powers that it doesn't have.
Regarding GPL (Score:4, Insightful)
Regarding the comment earlier about how "sensationalistic article submissions" seems to be the way to make it through the editors, I completely agree. So many story submissions are one-paragraph editorials versus simple presentation of the facts/details that it's getting downright annoying. It certainly doesn't feel like the