
The ongoing fight against GPL enforcement - mjg59
http://mjg59.dreamwidth.org/10437.html
======
jlarocco
Maybe I misunderstood, but I'm not seeing how this is bad.

Sony wants to write a BusyBox that doesn't use BusyBox's license? What exactly
is the problem? If they don't like the license isn't that the best approach
they can take?

"A couple of weeks ago, this page appeared on the elinux.org wiki. It's
written by an engineer at Sony, and it's calling for contributions to
rewriting Busybox. This would be entirely reasonable if it were for technical
reasons, but it's not - it's explicitly stated that companies are afraid that
Busybox copyright holders may force them to comply with the licenses of
software they ship. If you ship this Busybox replacement instead of the
original Busybox you'll be safe from the SFC. You'll be able to violate
licenses with impunity."

Wait, didn't GNU and the GPL start off for the completely non-technical reason
that Stallman didn't like the original license?

I'm also not sure I like the idea of using BusyBox as a backdoor to examine
the rest of a product's source code. I didn't realize that was a condition of
the GPL, but it makes me glad I've switched most of my projects over to the
BSD and ISC licenses.

~~~
gcp
This is bad because Busybox has copyright holders that actively enforce the
GPL on their product.

They're not asking for this because they dislike Busybox'es GPL license.
They're asking for it because they know Busybox actually goes to court to
enforce it, and asks for the other GPL products to have their license
respected too.

I'll spell it out more clearer: they want to get rid of Busybox, because its
one of the only things whose license they cannot violate with impunity.

~~~
angersock
So, if they switch to (say) a full BSD-licensed stack, what is the problem?
They can use it for whatever, modify the code for whatever, and there
shouldn't be any problems.

Why is this a bad thing, other than that it weakens the importance of the GPL?

~~~
thristian
If they were going to switch to a full BSD-licensed stack, there would be no
problem.

They want to switch to a mostly-GPL stack, except for the one component that
causes them to have to live up to their GPL obligations.

~~~
angersock
Ah, so, that's kind of a dick move. Thanks for the explanation!

------
fryguy
So an analogy would be that Pirate Steve wants to put the entire criterion
collection (<http://www.criterion.com/library>) on the pirate bay. However, he
knows that Fox is really litigious about their movies, so he replaces all of
their movies with garage remakes (like "Be Kind, Rewind") so that he can
safely pirate the rest of the movies since the other motion picture studios
are lazy.

Is my analogy correct at all? Essentially Sony wants to be able to pirate
(that's what it's called when you're redistributing things that are
copywritten), so they're removing the only project that actually litigates
against them?

~~~
thristian
That's the gist, yes.

------
bediger
So much for the Holy Sacrament of "Intellectual Property". When it suits a
corporation, the Most Holy Eye Pee Must Be Protected By Any Means, Including
Taking Away of Civil Liberties. But when it also suits a corporation, they get
to take what, if they owned it, would be Most Holy Eye Pee.

What a bunch of hypocrites. If BusyBox made Sony money, they'd fight an
attempt to replace it tooth and nail, as AT&T did with BSD.

------
dman
In case someone from Sony is reading this - things like this result in lost
sales. I research my buying options extensively and usually make a ranking of
alternatives. The following sony products were at the top of their respective
lists but I chose to not to buy them a) Camera - Sony Nex-5N (Bought a Canon
S90 instead) b) Laptop - Sony Vaio Z with the 1920x1080 screen (Bought an HP
Elitebook instead) c) Camcorder - HDR-CX700V (Bought a Panasonic TM900
instead) d) Noise cancelling headphones - MDR-NC100D (Bought Sennheiser ones
instead, dont remember the model number)

~~~
technomancy
I don't know about that; at this point anyone who cares about high standards
has been boycotting Sony since the rootkit fiasco. Of course, this makes
things worse, but that's not saying much.

~~~
dman
When I said things like this, I definitely meant to include the rootkit
fiasco. The last couple of years I do try my best to not buy from companies
that I think have an antipathy to the hacker ethic.

------
danielpal
Someone should re-write this blog post and re-submit it to Hacker News. It's
so confusing what the problem really is, or what the author is really saying.
I had to read this about 3 times to understand it. He should just say: many
hardware manufactures use several GPL projects on there embedded devices, one
of those projects is BusyBox. Since BusyBox copyright holders allow SFC to
defend their copyright, the SFC is able to force this manufactures to comply
with the licenses of all the GPL projects they use. Sony and other
manufactures are looking to have a BusyBox alternative so that they can
infringe the other GPL product licenses they use, since they know no-one
enforces this licenses. Those who own GPL licenses should contact the SFC and
allow them to enforce there copyrights.

------
lunarscape
>The SFC will grant a new license, but on one condition - not only must you
provide the source code to Busybox, you must provide the source code to all
other works on the device that require source distribution.

Wait what? This has actually happened?

~~~
tikhonj
That's more than fair: you can use our code as long as you don't rip anybody
else off either.

~~~
dedward
fair as long as theother rightsholders involved are informed..... it is their
choice whether or not to force the license issue - for all we know they
decided to let sony have software X..... if this is done without implicit
cooperation with other rightsholders, its sort of stretching......

~~~
vidarh
If Sony has received licenses to software X, then there's no problem:

> "you must provide the source code to all other works on the device that
> __require source distribution __"

If Sony has a different license from the copyright holders of software X that
means they're not required to distribute source, presumably all they need to
do is produce that license if their claim is challenged, or get said copyright
holders to confirm it.

------
pyre
As a thought experiment, it's funny to think about what GPL enforcement could
have done with SOPA, had it passed. Especially if software/firmware updates
were distributed via the web.

On the one hand Sony is pushing for SOPA, but on the other hand Sony is
violating the GPL. They could end up actively pushing through legislation that
ends up significantly harming their bottom line.

~~~
agravier
I'm confident that regardless of the ultimate outcome of the Battle For
Freedom on Internet and Intellectual Property, it will remain that the most
wealthy most often gains financially from their own wrongdoings. The judiciary
system will remain the warhammer of giants, way to heavy financially for most
individuals and small companies.

------
dthunt
This article mostly seems to be suggesting that vendors derive more benefit
from GPLv3 - which is more focused on coming into compliance, rather than
punishing companies that get it wrong.

I'm not sure what this has to do with busybox, save that under GPLv2 there are
vendors who are afraid to use them because they have actively been pursuing an
aggressive course of action under GPLv2 for several years.

------
AmazingBytecode
I'm not saying it's OK to violate the terms of open source licenses, but the
GPL has never fit with my idea of what Free Software should be like. I see
Free Software as a gift given to the world as a whole, regardless of what they
plan to do with it. Thus I see GNU and the FSF as terrible gift-givers.

~~~
HerraBRE
Free Software is not a gift. That is where you go wrong. Just because you want
it to be does not make it so.

Free Software, as advocated by the FSF and many others, is an attempt to
remedy the ethical problems posed by closed source software, which has a
strong tendency to lead to monopolistic behavior and unfair power balance
between the consumer and the producer of a program.

Free Software may be many other things as well, depending on who is writing
the software and releasing the code, but it's almost never a gift. The
developers almost always want something in return, whether that is
recognition, assistance with development or support for their ideals.

People who give software as a gift, release it into the Public Domain or use
the most liberal of the BSD licenses. :-P Those who chose other licenses, do
so for reasons you should respect if you intend to benefit from their work.

~~~
AmazingBytecode
"Those who chose other licenses, do so for reasons you should respect if you
intend to benefit from their work." Of course. Authors are free to release
software under whatever terms they like, and people who use the software are
bound to abide by those terms. Let me be clear, I don't think that it's OK to
violate the GPL. I was just saying that I don't really like the GPL.

------
larrik
SFC enforces copyrights on others behalf's?? Isn't that where Righthaven
failed because it isn't actually allowed?

~~~
Zak
Looking at SFC's website, it appears that people actually assign their
copyrights to SFC.

~~~
larrik
I can see why other projects are hesitant to join in.

------
trotsky
SFLC is far from a well supported organization in the GPL world. You say that
the busybox settlements are necessary because most authors lack the means or
the time to pursue violations, but in fact anyone who wished SFLC to act on
their behalf is free to let them - and yet no one does.

It is telling that not a single mainline kernel copyright holder will allow
them to, including your employer and many of your coworkers. As noted
elsewhere in the comments, Rob Landley regrets assigning them rights for
busybox, and no other authors have been represented in the suits.

 _The SFC will grant a new license, but on one condition - not only must you
provide the source code to Busybox, you must provide the source code to all
other works on the device that require source distribution._

Quoth wikipedia:

On 7 December 2007, a case was brought against Verizon Communications over its
distribution of firmware for Actiontec routers; this case was settled March
17, 2008 on condition of license compliance, _appointment of an officer to
oversee future compliance with free software licenses, and payment of an
undisclosed sum._

On about Aug 03, 2010, BusyBox won _triple damages of $90,000 and lawyers'
costs and fees of $47,865, and possession of "presumably a lot of high-def
TVs"_ as infringing equipment in the lawsuit Software Freedom Conservancy v.
Best Buy, etal., the GPL infringement case noted in the paragraph above.

The suit against High-Gain Antennas was settled on March 6, 2008 with the
company agreeing to comply with GPL and _paying an undisclosed sum to the
plaintiffs._

On October 30, 2007, an SFLC press release announced that the lawsuit had been
settled with Monsoon agreeing to comply with the GPL and _pay a sum of money
to the plaintiffs._

etc.

~~~
JoshTriplett
Please don't confuse the Software Freedom Law Center (SFLC, providers of legal
services to numerous FOSS projects) with the Software Freedom Conservancy
(SFC, a GPL enforcement organization who holds some of the copyrights to
Busybox). In particular, even if you don't like the work of the SFC, please
don't use that to complain about the SFLC, an entirely separate organization.

~~~
trotsky
Rob Landley sure seems to believe the SFLC is in control, as he repeatedly
faults the SFLC for their judgement in what suits to bring regarding busybox.
They share a number of directors and staff and a few years ago the
conservancy's web presence was hosted on a subdomain of the sflc.

In the SFLC's own press releases on the subject they note that they (the SFLC)
identified organizations not in compliance, set the terms for getting into
compliance, and decided who and when they should sue. At least at the time,
the director of the SFC was a paid staff member of the SFLC.

Doesn't really sound like entirely separate organizations to me.

[http://www.h-online.com/open/news/item/SFC-and-SFLC-sues-
Sam...](http://www.h-online.com/open/news/item/SFC-and-SFLC-sues-Samsung-
Zyxel-Western-Digital-and-others-over-GPL-violations-885777.html)

EDIT: quote: _Because many of its clients could benefit from the protections
of having a legal entity as well as tax exemption status, but were reluctant
to pay the fees associated with formation or dedicate the time necessary to
start and maintain a tax exempt nonprofit, the Software Freedom Law Center has
established The Software Freedom Conservancy. Since its launch in 2006, the
Conservancy has grown to include free and open source software projects active
in a wide range of fields._

[https://www.softwarefreedom.org/resources/2008/foss-
primer.h...](https://www.softwarefreedom.org/resources/2008/foss-
primer.html#x1-190003)

