IFOSSLR 4.1 available

Well, Bradley's assertion in this case (admittedly, he does say "I forget this every time", so he probably has other reasons to back it up), centers on a part of the article describing "FSF's view" regarding a specific item in the GPL FAQ, and says that it's "a trap for the unwary" because it contravenes business expectations. This context isn't included in his dent, so it makes it sound like FSF's views on copyleft in general or software in general are a trap for the unwary in general, which is not what the article is claiming at all.

In particular, that FAQ is about what does and doesn't count as distribution when someone is internally modifying GPL'd software under NDA, and that very much _can_ be a trap for the unwary, if "business expectations" are that a company and its contractors function as a single legal person. Quoting from the preceding sentence: "First, a practical problem: companies that hire consultants simply don’t distinguish between the business cases of in-house and contractor development. They do not expect to encounter a completely different GPL compliance landscape based on the distinction."

I would hope that most companies' legal departments don't count as unwary, but it's legitimate to argue that proprietary licensing agreements would typically include "and our contractors and business partners", and the GPL doesn't, and you should be aware of it.

It's also relevant -- as pointed out in the IFOSSLR article -- that GPLv3 avoids the word "distribute" _entirely because_ US copyright law already defines a meaning for that word. So claiming that GPLv2 is more legally ambiguous in the US because of its use of that term, which is a major thesis of the article, is actually in keeping with the FSF's own views. It's hard for me to believe that translates to it being anti-software-freedom propaganda. Free software as currently envisioned depends on strong and rigorous copyright law, and we should welcome rigor in interpreting copyright law and licenses.