Trying tot redefine reinstall? [LWN.net]

Trying tot redefine reinstall?

Posted Dec 25, 2025 17:42 UTC (Thu) by mjw (subscriber, #16740)
Parent article: A partial ruling in the Vizio GPL suit

The GPL seem really clear that the sources include the scripts and instructions to build and install the program. Which is exactly why I use it myself.

It feels like this tries to redefine what reinstall means by adding that it also means the device on which the modified program is installed keeps functioning exactly as before.

But that clearly isn't what the GPL says and isn't what is requested. So why was this motion even filed and ruled upon?

to post comments

Trying tot redefine reinstall?

Posted Dec 25, 2025 17:58 UTC (Thu) by josh (subscriber, #17465) [Link] (5 responses)

Because Vizio claimed that was what Conservancy was asking for, in the course of arguing against that strawman.

Trying tot redefine reinstall?

Posted Dec 25, 2025 18:16 UTC (Thu) by mjw (subscriber, #16740) [Link] (3 responses)

OK. I guess you can ask for a ruling on anything. Just surprised a judge wastes time on it.

So maybe the goal is simply to waste time and cause confusion pretending that install and reinstall mean different things?

It feels a bit like this isn't really arguing against user rights under the GPL to install modified versions of the program but that even by complying with the GPL the manufacturer can still refuse the right to repair for the proprietary blobs?

Trying tot redefine reinstall?

Posted Dec 26, 2025 18:47 UTC (Fri) by nevets (subscriber, #11875) [Link] (2 responses)

To me it looks more like the Judge is just clarifying what installations are. I could imagine that managers at Vizio or elsewhere don't really understand this, and of course would assume the worse. This should be obvious for us developers, but that's not who the audience is for this Judge. I'm happy he wrote what he wrote, as perhaps it will make non technically managers more comfortable with using Linux in the devices the ship.

Trying tot redefine reinstall?

Posted Dec 27, 2025 18:52 UTC (Sat) by Heretic_Blacksheep (guest, #169992) [Link] (1 responses)

The law runs on definitions. Lay people may dismiss this as semantics, but it's a fundamental of the practice of US law to say what you mean and mean what you say - exactly as stated and no more. That's why most of the better written statutes on the books define core terms to prevent people from shifting a law's meaning into something that fits an agenda that doesn't align with the law's intent as apparently one party tried to do in this case.

When a judge is in doubt because of ambiguity in the law, they usually fall back on how a term is likely understood by the general laity (hence the ruling). Another example of meeting necessary definitions would be all the federal lawsuits that additionally allege RICO violations - and the resultant ire of a federal judge because "the RICO" has a very specific construction and intent that almost no federal lawsuits alleging RICO meet. RICO (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act) is narrowly tailored to meet the federal government's need to take down organized crime syndicates, namely the "Five Families of New York" in the 1970s but also others since then. It's become a punctuation mark in federal lawsuits trying to win public opinion aspects as a "we think these are really bad people!!!111" mark instead where lawyers have been ignoring the definitions of the statute to try to make spectacle.

Trying tot redefine reinstall?

Posted Jan 8, 2026 8:58 UTC (Thu) by Wol (subscriber, #4433) [Link]

And in the UK, sometimes the law runs on Hansard ... :-)

Definitions are very important, but we've had a couple of cases where one side said "the law says ..." (and they were right), and the judges responded "But Hansard says" (the MPs were lied to), and they were, so the judges ruled "the law is invalid, passed by deception".

Cheers,
Wol

Strawmen all the way down

Posted Dec 25, 2025 21:28 UTC (Thu) by marcH (subscriber, #57642) [Link]

> ... arguing against that strawman.

= most of public discourse nowadays. Intentionally and not.

Communication is hard: you can never completely understand someone else. So it's much safer and more "reliable" to argue with oneself. In the same vein: prefer screens to minimize live interactions and exposure to different opinions. The latter can hurt!

How often do you see opinions actually evolve online? LWN comments is one of those rare non-echo chambers where it can still happen BTW.

It's sad to see even judges falling for this now... but judges can't stay forever isolated from new (a)social norms.

Don't get me wrong: even the entirety of public discourse still comes from a very small minority. And millions of views or clicks does not necessarily mean millions of people in full agreement. So there is still a chance "real" people are interested in listening to more than themselves.

Elections should be a better metric than clicks but voting systems have been getting from bad to worse :-(