Linked by Thom Holwerda on Fri 9th May 2008 13:19 UTC, submitted by Moulinneuf
In July of 2007, Skype lost a court case over their failure to include a copy of the GPL in their WSKP100 VoIP phone - it ran Linux, GPL software, which means a copy of the GPL license must be included. The case was started by the gpl-violations.org group. Skype decided to appeal against the decision, but it has decided to withdraw that appeal.
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Member since:2007-05-20
Member since:2005-11-06
RE[2]: Comment by sahaqiel
by JoeBuck on Fri 9th May 2008 17:28
in reply to "RE: Comment by sahaqiel"
Member since:2006-01-11
But that doesn't work. If you succeed in getting the GPL declared invalid, and you ship GPL code, you're still screwed. Without the GPL, you have no agreement with the copyright holder that allows you to distribute or modify the code, so you still have to take your product off the market.
The judge in the case said that if an author demands that a publisher publish his work in a green envelope, then the publisher has to either use a green envelope, or not publish, and it doesn't matter whether it's a stupid condition.
Member since:
2008-03-31
Skype-"But the GLP is an invalid license because it violates antitrust regulation."
Judge-"So you're just illegally shipping copyrighted code then?"
Skype-"Yeah... about that appeal, nevermind".
Edited 2008-05-09 14:21 UTC