License? [LWN.net]

License?

Posted Dec 1, 2010 1:10 UTC (Wed) by cmccabe (guest, #60281)
In reply to: License? by gmaxwell
Parent article: The kernel and the C library as a single project

> Your message appears to embody a commonly repeated piece of misinformation
> about how copyleft licenses work. I'm responding in order to squelch its
> continued dissemination, not because I disagree with your conclusion.
>
> "Is foo a legally a derived work of Bar" is almost never a important
> question with respect to license compliance of bundled software.
>
> The relevant software license sets out conditions under which is can be
> lawfully reproduced. Absent the license you can not lawfully reproduce the
> software. A license for Bar might specify that you can only reproduce the
> software on a computer that doesn't contain a copy of nethack and the
> requirement would be perfectly enforceable. Not become nethack is somehow
> a derivative of Bar and is thus tainted by bar's license but simply
> because the license of bar says so, and you're distributing bar so you
> must abide by the license or infringe. If you don't like it then you can
> opt not to distribute Bar by doing so escape its requirements.

Did you read this part of the GPLv2?

> In addition, mere aggregation of another work not based on the Program
> with the Program (or with a work based on the Program) on a volume of
> a storage or distribution medium does not bring the other work under
> the scope of this License.

Since both the kernel and glibc are under the GPLv2 here, your hypothetical considerations about licenses that restrict bundling are irrelevant. The OP is correct.

P.S. Not everything that companies try to throw into EULAs and software licenses is legally binding. I think a judge would probably disagree with you that requiring the user to uninstall an unrelated piece of software to use your software was "perfectly reasonable." Otherwise, Microsoft, IBM, and others would have used this tactic already.

to post comments

Yes, they do use this tatic.

Posted Dec 1, 2010 4:00 UTC (Wed) by khim (subscriber, #9252) [Link] (2 responses)

I think a judge would probably disagree with you that requiring the user to uninstall an unrelated piece of software to use your software was "perfectly reasonable." Otherwise, Microsoft, IBM, and others would have used this tactic already.

We are not talking about uninstallation. We are talking about bundling. And yes, restrictions here are quite legal and at least Microsoft actually uses this tatic - and judges accept it.

It's the same as with book: if you buy two books from authors which hate each other and then you can use scissors and glue to create "private compilation" of their works - noone can prevent this. But if you want to publish such compilation you'll need permission from both authors.

Not aggregation

Posted Dec 1, 2010 12:09 UTC (Wed) by tialaramex (subscriber, #21167) [Link]

Again, the Bootloader restriction doesn't say anything about aggregation.

The rule was, if you want OEM discounts for a Windows license the PC must actually boot Windows, using the Windows bootloader as supplied by Microsoft. Pre-install Linux, OpenBSD, BeOS and OS/2 on them if you like, but they must boot Windows, using the Windows bootloader.

Microsoft also separately asserted that OEMs mustn't sell non-Windows PCs if they want the discount. That's a much more obviously anti-competitive rule, and they've been beaten up for it on several occasions. But again it wasn't about aggregation - in this case the OEMs weren't providing Windows (on those PCs) at all.

Yes, they do use this tatic.

Posted Dec 2, 2010 0:42 UTC (Thu) by cmccabe (guest, #60281) [Link]

> We are not talking about uninstallation. We are talking about bundling.
> And yes, restrictions here are quite legal and at least Microsoft actually
> uses this tatic - and judges accept it.

As far as I know, the legality of those contracts between Microsoft and the OEMs was never tested in court. So you can't say "judges accept it," because they were never asked.

It would be incredibly self-destructive for any OEM to sue Microsoft over this matter, because Microsoft has the ability to make or break them by offering or witholding discounts on Windows. To put it another way, Microsoft is the sole supplier for an essential part-- the Windows license.

> It's the same as with book: if you buy two books from authors which hate
> each other and then you can use scissors and glue to create "private
> compilation" of their works - noone can prevent this. But if you want to
> publish such compilation you'll need permission from both authors.

That's a clear, obvious case of creating a derived work. It has nothing to do with bundling.

On a somewhat related note, I know that Microsoft claims (in their EULA) that you can't run certain versions of Windows inside a virtual machine. I'd really like to see the legality of that restriction tested in court.

If it's legal for them to enforce this restriction, then logically it should be legal for any program to do the same-- so we'd end up with a bunch of programs charging extra for the "prviliege" of using them inside a virtual machine.