It's both easier and simpler [LWN.net]

It's both easier and simpler

Posted Jun 7, 2011 8:15 UTC (Tue) by khim (subscriber, #9252)
In reply to: Android, forking, and control by idupree
Parent article: Android, forking, and control

Can you compare the GPL's burden on OEMs to a typical commercial licensing agreement?

It's different. And it's much, much, MUCH easier for the OEM to comply with typical commercial license. Not because it's intrinsically harder but because it's totally different.

Commercial licensing agreement is typically imposes lots of burdens (you must count number of licenses sold, you sometimes need to certify your changes or are not allowed to do them at all, etc), but this is the exact some burden hardware suppliers will ask for! Any OEM has well-oiled machinery to talk with suppliers - or it'll not be OEM for long.

GPL does not place any such obligations on OEM - but instead it tasks them with simpler but very unfamiliar task: now they must track their own changes and make them available to customer. This is not something they were ever prepared to do. The most they expected from customers is returns of broken or unsold goods - and even then they can just throw them away and replace with newer models if they so decide. Often they don't even have anyone who's responsibilities are even remotely similar (the sales people they have talk with retailers, not with customers).

So in short: it is easier to comply with GPL, but it's requirements put OEMs in the very unfamiliar position.

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It's both easier and simpler

Posted Jun 7, 2011 8:40 UTC (Tue) by michaeljt (subscriber, #39183) [Link]

> So in short: it is easier to comply with GPL, but it's requirements put OEMs in the very unfamiliar position.

I think part of the problem for OEMs is that with a "typical commercial licensing agreement" they have a single, usually friendly, person to talk to (this is a slight simplification in some cases, but still). With a GPL product they may potentially have to deal with any of the people who contributed to it, without even being sure how many people that may be, and they certainly can't be sure that some of those won't be actively looking for ways to hurt them. Which usually won't be the case of course, but I think the risk is still worrying for them.

It's both easier and simpler

Posted Jun 7, 2011 13:49 UTC (Tue) by lutchann (subscriber, #8872) [Link]

Exactly. Commercial licensing places the compliance burden on the legal and accounting departments. Copyleft licensing places most of the burden on the engineers. And since engineering is always, always, always the bottleneck when getting a consumer electronics product out the door, it greatly amplifies the cost of compliance.

Also, GPL violations are ubiquitous in the CE world and almost everyone gets away with it. It's just not something most small and mid-sized OEMs are concerned with in the least.