Eben Moglen on GPL Compliance and Building Communities: What Works (Linux.com) [LWN.net]

Linux.com has a transcript of Eben Moglen's talk in New York on October 28. "I have some fine clients and wonderful friends in this movement who have been getting rather angry recently. There is a lot of anger in the world, in fact, in politics. Our political movement is not the only one suffering from anger at the moment. But some of my angry friends, dear friends, friends I really care for, have come to the conclusion that they’re on a jihad for free software. And I will say this after decades of work—whatever else will be the drawbacks in other areas of life—the problem in our neighborhood is that jihad does not scale." There is a video of the talk available as well.

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Eben Moglen on GPL Compliance and Building Communities: What Works (Linux.com)

Posted Nov 3, 2016 12:30 UTC (Thu) by oldtomas (guest, #72579) [Link] (14 responses)

It's worth a read, as I've come to expect of Eben Moglen.

I'm torn on some things, and perhaps the world looks a bit different this side of the pond.

In any case, I wonder who BigCorp is... that one with the incomplete fruit is well known for its hatred of the GPL (which I guess is a consequence of still being haunted by that house ghost... well, you know history).

Eben Moglen on GPL Compliance and Building Communities: What Works (Linux.com)

Posted Nov 3, 2016 13:01 UTC (Thu) by spender (guest, #23067) [Link] (4 responses)

I thought the talk worked better as support for the BSD license, as taking the Ted/Greg view really only speaks to people who care about free in terms of getting more contributions, not in ensuring everyone plays by the same rules. I don't know how you can say (as a lawyer) that taking the legal route, establishing precedence, is the wrong way to go to ensure the masses comply with the GPL. I've talked to a number of lawyers in different capacities about the GPL, and regardless of their opinion (stay away from it, it's too risky / you could get away with x,y,z) the first thing they always mention is the severe lack of case law about it. Companies especially don't like that kind of uncertainty, so why don't the people who have the ability to do something about it see that as a problem?

I don't see the damage as coming from people who litigate the GPL (since there's so little of that happening). It seems to me that a parallel occurance adding to the problem is that free software has been co-opted by corporate interests, and what once was somewhat a "by developers, for developers" community has greatly expanded into "by developers, for complainers and people profiting off GPL violations" which eliminates the fun that attract people to publish GPL software in the first place. There are always people that will just want to give things away for free, and for them there's BSD. But the appeal of the GPL for me was always the level playing field, especially given that there have been minimal contributions to our code.

I also wonder about the timing of this and the FSF's announcement, if there's now some rift between Linux Foundation (and those seeking to regain Linux Foundation funding) views on the GPL, vs the rest. Actually, it seems the entire topic has been co-opted, and there's no longer a voice for the rest of us anymore.

-Brad

Eben Moglen on GPL Compliance and Building Communities: What Works (Linux.com)

Posted Nov 3, 2016 13:20 UTC (Thu) by oldtomas (guest, #72579) [Link]

> I thought the talk worked better as support for the BSD license [...]

Yes, I see one could read that this way. I mostly agree with your other points.

Working at a biggish corporation, I'm always pretty disgusted at the way they pronounce "Free Software" by pouting their lips and saying "opensource", as if they were uttering a Dirty Word(TM). Or how my boss's boss tells us "avoid GPL at all costs" while saving a shitload of money by deploying hordes of Dockers with... a Linux kernel in them.

In that sense I could well belong to the Angry People Eben is referring to in his speech. As I said, I'm torn on what I read. My anger is Of Course Right (TM) -- but I don't like to be seen as an Angry Man :-)

That's why I think it's worth a read, and a re-read. It's not as if we didn't need a critical thinking about our positions from time to time (I know I need that). Even if it sometimes hurts a bit.

Eben Moglen on GPL Compliance and Building Communities: What Works (Linux.com)

Posted Nov 4, 2016 6:22 UTC (Fri) by louie (guest, #3285) [Link] (2 responses)

Without commenting more generally on the talk or the issue of enforcement...

Companies especially don't like that kind of uncertainty, so why don't the people who have the ability to do something about it see that as a problem?

Getting certainty by setting firm legal precedent in a courtroom/judicial setting is expensive and time-consuming. More importantly, it is risky - you might get certainty, but not the certainty you want. If you could snap your fingers to get it, great, but that's not how it works. So the uncertainty may be better all the way around.

(IAAL, BIANYL, except in the sort of metaphysical sense that I am full of Miguel-ian love for all users of any open license.)

Eben Moglen on GPL Compliance and Building Communities: What Works (Linux.com)

Posted Nov 4, 2016 13:04 UTC (Fri) by NAR (subscriber, #1313) [Link]

More importantly, it is risky - you might get certainty, but not the certainty you want.

Like the VMware suit...

Eben Moglen on GPL Compliance and Building Communities: What Works (Linux.com)

Posted Nov 4, 2016 13:05 UTC (Fri) by spender (guest, #23067) [Link]

I definitely get that it's an expensive, time-consuming process. But that's kinda my point: the majority of people developing GPL software (especially people doing it in their free time) don't have the resources to pursue that. We depend on the FSF and SFLC to pursue those things for us. So I don't understand how after years of not really pursuing that angle to the point where there's so much uncertainty, that these same people are utterly convinced that the angle they haven't tried is definitely the wrong one.

Maybe it works fine for the Linux kernel in terms of getting more contributions, because the kernel is mostly developed by full-time employees these days. But LLVM is getting a ton of contributions too, and it's not GPL'd. Most of the people involved in kernel development are replaceable, move from company to company, etc. They're contributing as a job. I don't see how that extrapolates to the majority of GPL'd software though, especially to projects with few contributions or where contributions aren't the primary goal.

-Brad

Eben Moglen on GPL Compliance and Building Communities: What Works (Linux.com)

Posted Nov 4, 2016 15:20 UTC (Fri) by gasche (subscriber, #74946) [Link] (8 responses)

> In any case, I wonder who BigCorp is...
> that one with the incomplete fruit is well known for its hatred of the GPL

Wrong guess, in this case BigCorp is Intel:
https://www.nsf.gov/pubs/2016/nsf16606/nsf16606.htm

Eben Moglen on GPL Compliance and Building Communities: What Works (Linux.com)

Posted Nov 4, 2016 17:22 UTC (Fri) by dunlapg (guest, #57764) [Link] (7 responses)

Well knowing that, the restriction seems a lot less insidious to me.

Intel wants the research to be able to be used by any of its customers. Some of its customers will not want to use GPL software. So they stipulate that the code not be GPL / share-alike.

Is it a surprise that many businesses are suspicious of the GPL? We knew that. Is it a surprise, then, that Intel would want to accommodate those businesses when funding research? I don't think this is Intel hating on the GPL; it's just trying to make their research dollars go as far as they can.

Eben Moglen on GPL Compliance and Building Communities: What Works (Linux.com)

Posted Nov 5, 2016 17:26 UTC (Sat) by Wol (subscriber, #4433) [Link] (5 responses)

And what's to stop the person doing the work (writing the software) releasing it themselves under the GPL?

Certainly, from what I understood reading it, the deal was JOINT copyright, which means Intel could release it BSD and the developer release it GPL, and where's the problem?

Cheers,
Wol

Eben Moglen on GPL Compliance and Building Communities: What Works (Linux.com)

Posted Nov 6, 2016 0:03 UTC (Sun) by pabs (subscriber, #43278) [Link] (4 responses)

Eben is saying this is a lever used by Intel to move the developer population away from copyleft through influencing those who haven't yet made an idealogical commitment to one or the other side. It isn't about any one developer not being able to make the choices they want, it is about large scale influencing of the direction of choices not yet made. aka political manipulation. There are probably many more examples of this in the world of software.

Eben Moglen on GPL Compliance and Building Communities: What Works (Linux.com)

Posted Nov 6, 2016 9:36 UTC (Sun) by Wol (subscriber, #4433) [Link] (3 responses)

In other words, Free Software is losing the battle with Open Source.

Provided they don't both lose the battle with closed source, I don't see a problem ... although I do take the point - Free Software sets out to force compliance with the Laws of the Commons ... but it conflicts with the fact that developers have to eat ...

I don't have strong feelings either way - I'm a FLOSS guy not FS or OS.

Cheers,
Wol

Eben Moglen on GPL Compliance and Building Communities: What Works (Linux.com)

Posted Nov 6, 2016 10:41 UTC (Sun) by Wol (subscriber, #4433) [Link]

I should add, also, that as a European I remember the days when the civilised world just relied on copyright for software protection. Quite a lot of software was sold in source-code form, protected by licence.

Now that the American Federal Circuit is coming round to the opinion that software cannot be protected by patent, we may be going back to that civilised age, and the distinction between Free and Open software may become far less relevant (don't forget, all this stems from the days the US was dragged kicking and screaming into the 20th-century world of copyright, and suddenly discovered they could use it as an offensive economic weapon ...)

Cheers,
Wol

Eben Moglen on GPL Compliance and Building Communities: What Works (Linux.com)

Posted Nov 6, 2016 14:21 UTC (Sun) by pizza (subscriber, #46) [Link]

The "developers have to eat" argument applies equally to "open source" as well, as the problem is the availability of source code (and how it enables the user) more so than the actual license involved.

Unfortunately, IMO Open Source is inherently unstable, and will (again) lead to the rise of proprietary Closed Source forks of what was once open as the pendulum inevitably swings back to everyone trying to value-add themselves some sort of commercial advantage. Similar to how the BSD and UNIX wars ended in a victory for Microsoft, the early stages are already happening again.

Meanwhile, Free Software (primarily copyleft, but also BSD-style stuff whose development is funded by foundations and the like) will keep trucking along in the background, making slow buy steady progress. Again.

Eben Moglen on GPL Compliance and Building Communities: What Works (Linux.com)

Posted Nov 7, 2016 2:14 UTC (Mon) by pabs (subscriber, #43278) [Link]

I think it really depends on which examples you want to cherry-pick to support your case. For example I heard HPE defaults to GPLv3 for new code they write.

Eben Moglen on GPL Compliance and Building Communities: What Works (Linux.com)

Posted Nov 13, 2016 15:15 UTC (Sun) by paulj (subscriber, #341) [Link]

And Google didn't want GPL for android cause their customers / prospective adopters didn't want GPL. And there are many other examples of the same argument.

"We're just being pragmatic". "It's not us, its our customers".

The end-result though is that software ecosystems are going back to the 80s Unix model. An initial open-source code-base that then gets fragmented off into various proprietary splinters, and the open-source code base gets very little contributed back.

All the most successful, feature-full and useful versions will be completely closed. The open code base will struggle to stay useful to /end-users/ (still be useful as a base for new proprietary splinters). The end-users are left with a morass of systems that are similar, but always with subtle incompatibilities here and there. (The executives call that "value-add").

Back to the future. Sigh.