Monsoon Multimedia responds on GPL

Posted Sep 26, 2007 3:27 UTC (Wed) by grouch (guest, #27289)
In reply to: Monsoon Multimedia responds on GPL by Gary-MM
Parent article: Monsoon Multimedia gives in on GPL

Along the way, we have unwittingly neglected to honor the terms of the GPL which requires us to obtain permission from the copyright holders of any software component for which we have modified the code in order to deliver our product.

No, it doesn't. You still seem to be confused about the GPL.

The GPL already grants you permission, from the copyright holders, to modify and distribute the code under certain conditions. It is a unilateral, but conditional, grant of permission. The layman's summary of those conditions is that you have to pass on the same rights to the code as you received. You failed to do that. You received the source but you did not pass it on with your binaries. You imposed additional restrictions on the code beyond those under which you received it.

The only time you must seek permission from the copyright holders to modify and distribute code licensed under the GPL is when you wish to do something that is outside the scope of permissions granted by the GPL. In this case, you failed to distribute the source or an offer to obtain the source and you added an End User License Agreement which contradicts the GPL.

Please note that I am not a lawyer, am not one of the copyright holders, and have no standing in the complaint against Monsoon Multimedia. I make extensive use of software released under the GPL, have contributed minorly to some GPL'd projects, and have a very strong interest in free (libre) software. I am thus a part of the "free software community in general" to which you aim your apology, but I am completely unimpressed by that apology. Unless and until the BusyBox copyright holders announce they are satisfied, any apology is empty.

While the press of business concerns may lead to oversights, copyright infringement is no less grave simply because it is a business infringing copyright owned by individuals. The license chosen for the BusyBox developers' work is not nearly as complex as the legalistically obfuscated list of denials of rights that comprise the typical proprietary software company's EULA. Turn the tables around and imagine that apology being posted.

Monsoon Multimedia responds on GPL

Posted Sep 27, 2007 8:38 UTC (Thu) by drag (guest, #31333) [Link] (3 responses)

Beleive me, people make honest mistakes. Failure to release code as per the GPL is one of them.

Realy, they do. Especially for companies that are more hardware oriented then software oriented. They are used to using and modifying other people's creations to do things they need them to do.. it's not at all like software develoment were all this licensing on what you can and cannot do with a object is normal.

Software to them would be just another componant. Something to 'make work' and be done with it. As soon as that portion is done it's a race to put out the next fire. For them government regulatory compliance is what they are used to dealing with. Not licensing restrictions on stuff they soldier to their circuit boards.

What this press release illistrates is that even after all that have happenned they are still confused and still don't understand what the FSF is suing them for.

Hell, I wouldn't be suprised if they thought the letters and attempts at communication (earlier from pre-trial) from the copyright holders was confused with the standard 402 nigerian email scams and was dismissed by some secretary that barely knows what a mouse is, much less what busybox is. And thus everybody else that potentially had a clue didn't even know that people were starting to get pissed at them.

Monsoon Multimedia responds on GPL

Posted Sep 27, 2007 8:56 UTC (Thu) by drag (guest, #31333) [Link] (1 responses)

For future reference... in order to comply with the GPL, and generally, other open source licenses what you need to do is make a website or a ftp site or whatever.

On that site take the code that you used to compile the software for the firmware and stick it on there in a tarball or zip file or something like that. Have a new tarball/zip file for each new firmware revision you release.

Not just the changes or the original tarball, but what you actually used in the released product. The idea is that a person can recreate the licensed software themselves using that tarball.

Then, along with other documentation in your product, you supply a peice of paper or something equally accessable, that documents were the end user can obtain the source code.

Then that's it. From what I understand that will do nicely.

Another option would be to include the source code on a cdrom with the product and a written offer to supply the source code for anybody for any firmware revision on cdrom willing to pay for the very minimal cost of postage and the cdrom media.

Shouldn't be a big deal. 99.9% of your customers aren't going to give a shit either way.

(I am not a lawyer)

Monsoon Multimedia responds on GPL

Posted Sep 28, 2007 6:03 UTC (Fri) by sepreece (guest, #19270) [Link]

"For future reference... in order to comply with the GPL, and generally, other open source licenses what you need to do is make a website or a ftp site or whatever."

While this may, in fact, satisfy most authors who release their code under the GPL, it technically does not satisfy the GPLv2 terms, which allow web distribution of the source ONLY if the distribution of the executable is also web-based. Otherwise you must either provide the source or provide an offer to provide the source on a distribution medium.

GPLv3 liberalizes this restriction - GPLv2 was written when broadband was less widely available.

Monsoon Multimedia responds on GPL

Posted Sep 27, 2007 10:32 UTC (Thu) by dlang (guest, #313) [Link]

not all of the pre-lawsuit communication was electronic, they sent the message on paper via fed-ex and the company rep signed for it.

when you get something from a lawyer that you have to sign for and then don't respond to it in a timely manner it's hard to explain away as an honest mistake. (and note that the response doesn't need to be an answer to the accusation, it can be a simple "we've received this and are investigating, please give us until X to do so", the date proposed may not be accepted, but it's still far better then silence)