
Linux beats legal threat from one of its own developers - WayneSmallman
http://www.zdnet.com/article/linux-beats-internal-legal-threat/
======
larkeith
Unless I'm missing something, it sounds like McHardy has only dropped one of
his "over 38" cases, due to the potential for a much more expensive, risky
legal battle. What's to prevent him from continuing his activities in other
jurisdictions under less savvy judges?

Also, how is this a victory by Linux? I see no mention of activity by the rest
of the Linux community while Geniatech fought the legal battle.

~~~
bsder
I also don't understand how this is even an issue.

The companies can make him go away simply by complying with the GPL, no?

While what McHardy is doing may not be the most diplomatic stunt, it's kind of
hard for me to sympathize when the companies wouldn't have to pay anything if
they would just _comply with the GPL license_.

If you don't want to comply with the GPL, use BSD or something.

Am I missing something or could these companies sidestep all the legal BS with
a minimal amount of effort.

~~~
tinus_hn
If that were true you could resolve a file sharing lawsuit by stopping your
torrent client. It doesn’t work like that.

~~~
bsder
In the case of a torrent, the media companies generally are citing theft
(rightly or wrongly) and damages. You can't just resolve theft legally by
returning the thing stolen.

I don't see anybody citing theft. And, quite often, license compliance _IS_
legally resolved by coming into compliance.

However, I still find it hard to sympathize. Don't want this problem--comply
with the GPL or don't use GPL software. The GPL is functioning as written and
intended.

There is a reason so many companies consider GPL-licensed software to be
radioactive.

~~~
tinus_hn
> I don't see anybody citing theft

That's because it is a concept that doesn't exist. Creating a copy in
violation of copyright is not theft.

Copyright is the right to limit others ability to create copies. That
limitation doesn't involve things that can be stolen.

------
julienfr112
In fact, he acted like a bounty hunter : chasing wrongdoers ( companies that
do not comply with the GPLv2) for his own personal gain. If you are serious
about the GPL license, you should also be serious about punishing companies
that violate it. And if the Free Software Foundation has not enough guns, why
not let bounty hunters do the job ?

~~~
detaro
Because the Linux Kernel community doesn't do enforcement like that not
because they don't have enough guns, but because they believe it to be harmful
to the overall ecosystem. If you plan to slowly herd them to where you want
them, a bounty hunter taking loud potshots scaring everyone doesn't help.

The theory is that a violating Linux-based device where you can try to get the
manufacturer to fix this in the future is better than a device with a closed
system and no chance of getting it opened because the manufacturer was scared
of legal consequences of using Linux.

~~~
sametmax
But if the licence is not enforced, then what's the point of writing it or
using it ? Put it under WTFL. Shorter, less paper work.

~~~
dizzystar
If it was under WTFL, the company would be able to release everything closed-
source, which is exactly what the open source community is trying to
discourage.

It also makes no sense to sue the companies violating the licenses. They would
be more inclined to move to a closed-source option with a known fee, since the
very product you are using has an ambiguous cost attached to it.

For example, I have deep disdain for people who build up WordPress or Drupal
sites for clients and flat out refuse to let the customer have their code, but
that still doesn't mean they should get sued to oblivion, no matter how much I
disagree with this practice.

If you are for open source, you want to actively encourage the use of these
platforms (regardless if you think they are trash) instead of having these
people move over to some equally bad system. This is worse for the OSS
community. It's also worse for the customer, since hidden fees for MS or
Oracle will be tacked onto the product price. If word got out, even those who
follow GPLv2 to a T would have reason to be nervous, so they'd just migrate
off the platform as well.

~~~
sametmax
> If it was under WTFL, the company would be able to release everything
> closed-source, which is exactly what the open source community is trying to
> discourage.

Apparently they already can. If there is no enforcement, what prevents anybody
from doing it ? Good will.

> but that still doesn't mean they should get sued to oblivion, no matter how
> much I disagree with this practice.

Remove "should" and "to oblivion", and the result seems reasonable. After all,
we can't give tickets like for speeding for those infraction. The only problem
with sueing here is the cost of it.

But it's perfectly alright from a moral point of view. People worked hard,
sometimes for free, for free software to exist, out of idealism. The only
thing they demand is to accept the licence.

~~~
wiz21c
Yup, all of that is strange. Because if enforcement is rare, then a simple
risk analysis allows everyone to leech without contributing back. Even more so
if the only punishment you may have is "comply" (publishing code that is tied
to your own personal hardware is not that much a problem, I think).

Now that everybody knows the true political aim of the GPLv3 and that we know
the pragmatism of BSD and others, I wonder under what license would the kernel
have been published today...

~~~
tpxl
>publishing code that is tied to your own personal hardware is not that much a
problem, I think

Code tied to your own hardware can lead to reverse engineering and creating
other software to be used with said hardware. This is a good thing (for the
user) though.

------
lovelearning
Very OT, but I just found it funny that this renowned tech website that has
published articles like "It's HTTPS or bust: How to secure your website"[1]
doesn't use HTTPS itself.

[1]: [http://www.zdnet.com/article/how-to-secure-your-
website/](http://www.zdnet.com/article/how-to-secure-your-website/)

~~~
greglindahl
When you see this for a news website, it's usually because they deal with
dodgy ad networks that aren't https yet.

------
shdon
I'll admit this is offtopic, but why on earth do they insist on putting an
unrelated video on autoplay at the top of the page? I'm there to read the
article and just when I've read the first few sentences, I get distracted by
movement and the sound of Linux Torvalds' voice. Something about DRM and GPLv3
which are not at all related to the article contents. Sure, it might be an
interesting video, but on autoplay... really?

~~~
neotek
You can disable autoplay in Chrome by navigating to chrome://flags and setting
the "autoplay policy" config option to require explicit user activation.

In Firefox, navigate to about:config, and change media.autoplay.enabled to
false.

~~~
SmellyGeekBoy
The video autoplayed for me so I decided to check this setting which I was 99%
sure I had already set at some point in the past (I use Chrome).

Turns out I had and ZDNet is somehow getting around it.

Another site for the blacklist, then.

~~~
krylon
You might want to give uMatrix a try. It can be a bit of a pain at times, but
in my experience, it catches autoplay videos quite reliably, as well as a lot
of ads.

------
rootusrootus
I am probably missing something here, as usual, but this does not really sound
like a clear win. Is the Linux community effectively enforcing compliance with
the GPL? I sort of understand how someone could see individual litigation to
be a threat to the ecosystem, but doesn't that assume that we value usage more
than compliance? Isn't it also a threat to the ecosystem if developers decide
not to contribute because they feel their code will just get stolen for
commercial profit?

Maybe this makes more sense if the vast majority of kernel developers are
commercially funded and not volunteers.

~~~
juliangoldsmith
What I got from this article is that the guy was basically trying to extort
money from companies that hadn't complied in the past.

This particular company fixed their compliance issues, and Patrick McHardy
still went after them once they had. He did so while hiding it from other
kernel developers, and kept all of the money for himself.

------
progval
short version: a (major) contributor to Linux sued companies that infringes on
Linux's license for his personal gain, but a judge finally stopped him by
ruling that he cannot sue over the entire kernel.

------
vog
I'm aware that copyright assignments are often seen as an unnecessary burden
to potential contributors, but for large projects like the Linux kernel this
actually makes sense.

This would have never happed with any GNU project, or OpenLayers, etc.

~~~
philipwhiuk
If I publish my work as open source I want it to be kept open source. Linux
doesn't seem that interested in the second part.

------
paulsutter
If anyone needed another reason to avoid GPL software here you go. I thought
the whole idea of open source was to avoid litigious assholes.

~~~
rdtsc
> I thought the whole idea of open source was to avoid litigious assholes.

How is that? Not sure what you mean.

Writing everything from scratch in-house is how you usually avoid litigious
assholes.

When using someone else's stuff it is a good idea to comply with the licensing
terms. That's also a valid strategy to avoid litigation.

~~~
ceejayoz
> Writing everything from scratch in-house is how you usually avoid litigious
> assholes.

Nah, that just gets you a patent suit.

~~~
rdtsc
I meant in regard to copyright. Can still get a patent suit even if using open
source software.

