A News.com article speculates about what changes may come to the General Public License as Richard Stallman and co. prepare for a third revision to the license that has become so important and controversial with the rise of Linux and other GPL-licensed software.
…as long as stupid software patents are around, more power to the GPL and its creator(s). 🙂
Amen To That Brother
Either you’ve badly misphrased your post or completely failed to comprehend the GPL. No version of the GPL has ever given “Stallman & co. liberty to do whatever they want with your software, including re-releasing it under any other license they choose.”
1) Won’t be compatible with a renamed version of itself.
Do you have some information that leads you to that conclusion. If that was the case I can only envision massive chaos.
anonymizationservice.com isn’t permabanned from posting.
There are so many anonymization services that banning one wouldn’t really do much. Rest, assured, we have a project in the works that should make it a little harder for “Mr. Troll” to get his kicks.
…that the name-stealing troll has chosen to pick on me as much as Rayiner, AdamW and David Adams. I must be doing something right… 🙂
Seriously, I’m intrigued by your “project” to make life harder for the troll. I’ve long asked for a user account system, so I’d be really happy if this is what you were preparing, but I have a feeling it’s something different…any estimates on when will this new feature be in place?
… switch to a system which needs some kind of registration!
1) Won’t be compatible with a renamed version of itself.
Do you have some information that leads you to that conclusion. If that was the case I can only envision massive chaos.
Item 6, GPL v2: “subject to these terms and conditions. You may not impose any further restrictions on the recipients’ exercise of the rights granted herein.” The new license is an additional restriction, as it cannot replace the original.
No version of the GPL has ever given “Stallman & co. liberty to do whatever they want with your software, including re-releasing it under any other license they choose.”
Item 9, GPL v2: “If the Program specifies a version number of this License which applies to it and “any later version”, you have the option of following the terms and conditions either of that version or of any later version published by the Free Software Foundation. If the Program does not specify a version number of this License, you may choose any version ever published by the Free Software Foundation.“
The GPL has nothing to do with freedom. It’s about trying to prevent corporate entities from profiting from free software. If freedom were its goal, it would be as open as the BSD license…
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The GPL has nothing to do with freedom. It’s about trying to prevent corporate entities from profiting from free software. If freedom were its goal, it would be as open as the BSD license…
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Hmmm…Red Hat and Novell must somehow be in violation of the GPL then, hmmm? IBM is a major violator then. If Stallman knew of these gross misuses of his license designed to prevent profiting from free software…..oh wait, he does, never mind. He is always very careful about referring to free as in freedom, not free as in beer. He says that companies can turn a profit using GPL software by either transfering the software (such as what linuxcd.org), providing warranties, providing indemnifications, etc. etc.
Maybe do a little research next time instead of pulling your “facts” out of your ass.
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“If the Program specifies a version number of this License which applies to it and “any later version”
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Key-word IF!!! DUH!!!! If I released program XYZ under the GPL, I could either say version 2 of the license or I could say version 2 or any later version. It is up to you. Again, like I said to the last person, please quit pulling your “facts” out of your ass and spreading FUD.
It makes me sad when we live in a day where little children have to resort to polluting comment boards to get a hard on and maybe put a little joy in their sad pathetic lives.
My suggestion is to unplug your computer from the wall there are alternatives to sitting in front of it, you can drag your heavy fat ass somewhere else and laugh and socialize with people outside of the computer screen you gaze at.
Then maybe when I visit this news site everyday I won’t have wasted the few minutes I have to browse the news sites reading your stupid garbage that appears here.
This place runs from a integrated forum/CMS with registration.
The better.
I agree. The GPL is too limiting for developers and does not allow for the spread of information freely. The BSD license is truely free and before people say that the GPL insures that the program remains free for life, the original BSD code will still be available if somebody else modifies it. Whichever license you use, don’t be angry if a company tries to make a profit off of it. That is the consequence of releasing the entire source code of your program.
Maybe the new GPL will fix the licensing derivative products problem. As it is right now, it is a direct threat to my making a living. Before somebody argues the support scheme, it doesn’t work well. It puts all of the companies value on the support people and makes the value of the developer close to 0. Also it relies on your program being much less than perfect which creates an incentive for not writing the program correctly the first time.
“Maybe the new GPL will fix the licensing derivative products problem. As it is right now, it is a direct threat to my making a living.”
The direct threat to your making a living is the wrong business model chosen by you as well as your expectation that other people will somehow adapt in order to make it feasible.
Just don’t base your work on GPL code — write your code from scratch and release it under any license you like. It’s that simple.
I don’t care if the “freedom as in GPL” is the real freedom (what is a real freedom anyway?) but it serves its goal, and that’s fine.
IBM really doesn’t give a crap about linux, they want to sell SERVICE AND SUPPORT FOR SERVERS. They don’t want to pay massive cycling fees to Microsoft to use Windows Server products.
It makes sense for IBM to use linux then. RedHat is in the support business as is all other corporate based linux distro’s. No one should have a problem with that since they do offer their software for free anyway, without support.
The purpose of the GPL is to prevent closed source software companies from benefitting from Free Open Source Software without contributing any fixes back to the author
Artem – And why your arguments make sense is because it’s the developers that have the rights, not the users. Users don’t code and don’t have any rights other than what developers give them – contrary to what Stallman would have us believe.
Altair, luckily most of the licenses used today aren’t as viral as straight GPL.
The purpose of the GPL is to prevent closed source software companies from benefitting from Free Open Source Software without contributing any fixes back to the author
That is a side effect to the GPL, but Stallman would completely disagree with you on what its purpose is.
Every1 always complains about the GPL being viral…Well, guess what? It’s the developers that choose the license, not the end users. So go write something yourself under a different license if you don’t like it as far as I’m concerned.
IBM really doesn’t give a crap about linux
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Really? I didn’t know. I could have sworn they had learned about Linux and the values of sharing touched IBM right in its heart, so it just decided to pour a billion dollars into Linux development for his “fellow man”
Bzzz. wrong. Try again. I wasn’t complaining that the GPL is viral, I was stating that as fact – and explaining to Altair that luckily for him most of the licenses aren’t as viral as the GPL.
I could care less what license someone chooses for their code (it’s their code after all). But there are consequences for every license chosen.
The purpose of the GPL (according to Stallman) is not so evil corporations can’t steal code from developers and not contribute back, but to give users rights. Stallman could care less about developer rights.
Let me try with a different emphasis:
Item 9, GPL v2: “If the Program specifies a version number of this License which applies to it and “any later version”, you have the option of following the terms and conditions either of that version or of any later version published by the Free Software Foundation.
You get to decide, not the Free Software Foundation. Also, the original statement was indeed false when it said the GPL gave “Stallman & co. liberty to do whatever they want with your software”. The truth is that the original author(s) of the code remain its copyright holders, and Stallman and co. can’t do anything they want with it. Some project managers do attribute the copyrights to the FSF, but these are few and far between.
So, in fact, the original modded down poster was wrong, and the anonymous poster who rebutted him was right.
You’re the living proof that one can earn money with Linux, a GPLed program. You statement directly invalidates that of altair.
altair
before people say that the GPL insures that the program remains free for life, the original BSD code will still be available if somebody else modifies it.
Yes, but derivatives won’t be. The GPL insures that derivatives will be free as well. Therefore the GPL, though it has more restrictions than the BSDL, makes sure that more software is free.
Lumbergh is right, the BSD gives more freedom to developers, but the GPL makes sure that users continue to enjoy free (as in speech) software. However, Lumbergh doesn’t seem to care about users’ (i.e. customers’) rights. This is where we differ. I think users’ rights are as important than those of developers.
Anyway, back to your irrational, emotional RMS-bashing!
The GPL is too limiting for developers and does not allow for the spread of information freely.
The second part of your sentence is completly untrue. While one can argue that the GPL may be too limiting for some developers (I guess a lot of them would disagree, seeing how many GPL apps are out there), the fact is that the GPL allows for a freer spread of information than basically any other license, because it makes sure that the information and its derivatives remain free.
But, as usual, it’s a matter of personal choice. If you don’t like the GPL, don’t develop programs that are derivatives of GPLed programs. End of story.
You’re the living proof that one can earn money with Linux, a GPLed program. You statement directly invalidates that of altair.
And if glibc wasn’t LGPL or GPL with linking exceptions (forget which it is) and the kernel license prohibited closed-source from riding on top of it, then Linux would be useless to us.
I don’t have a problem with developers choosing straight GPL. It’s their code. They just have to understand their motivations for distributing their software and choose an appropriate license.
and the kernel license prohibited closed-source from riding on top of it
Why would the kernel license prohibit this? This is like saying “if the GPL required us to sacrifice a chicken every time we use the program, it would be useless to us.”
For the record, I prefer the LGPL for libraries and anything that is linked to by other programs. I’m all for interoperability, and if the GPL prohibits this in certain cases then it just means it’s not the right license for that particular piece of software.
I also agree with you that the license is the developer’s choice, and that he’s free to choose whichever one he wants. (Wow, we actually agree on something…perhaps the Christmas spirit has managed to reach us after all!)
Happy holidays, everyone! Let’s hold the flamewars until 2005, all right? (Well, one can dream, right? 😉
Why would the kernel license prohibit this? This is like saying “if the GPL required us to sacrifice a chicken every time we use the program, it would be useless to us.”
Actually, I was intentionally vague on the kernel, because even though it is GPL you can link closed source applications to it. In fact, I’m not even sure what the exact license of the kernel is and I don’t think it’s LGPL. Maybe it’s GPL + linking exception. I don’t know how it could be straight GPL because then how could closed-source apps link to it without providing source.
The kernel is just a computer program like any other program. There’s nothing stopping someone from writing a kernel that had a license that would effectively open source all the programs that link to it. Of course, then you get into issues like if you write a libc that is BSD licensed and that is used on this hypothetical pure GPL kernel, how does that affect the program that link to the BSD glibc. Most apps link to glibc, and do not use system calls directly.
Of course, I’m a developer and IANAL so maybe there’s an easy explanation.
Actually, now that I think about it. There was a bit of a controversy recently regarding GPL and MIT/X11 code interaction. SharpDevelop is licensed under the GPL. The MonoDevelop developers (which is a mono port of the windows C# program) wanted to write plugins that used a MIT/X11 license. The Sharpdevelop developers didn’t think it was legal and after ensuing flames on the monodevelop mailinglist, the sharpdevelop developers took the matter to the FSF which replied, stating that you could write MIT/X11 licensed plugins.
Anyway, all this crap is so confusing and the GPL hasn’t even been tested in court yet that I’m aware of.
And that makes me wonder what the Hurd license is.
And that makes me wonder what the Hurd license is.
GPL for the hurd servers and GNUMach. Additionally, the authors assign copyright to the FSF.
L4-Pistaschio, the new microkernel for the Hurd, is GPL-compat BSD-license.