Changing CentOS in mid-stream
Changing CentOS in mid-stream
Posted Dec 13, 2020 16:09 UTC (Sun) by johannbg (guest, #65743)In reply to: Changing CentOS in mid-stream by pizza
Parent article: Changing CentOS in mid-stream
Anyway the big irony in Red Hat's management deciding to solve a broken sales strategy by obfuscation their source code and expecting that competing company would change its business practice ( Yeah like Larry "lawnmower" Ellis would suddenly grow a conscience ) as a result of that, is that Red Hat's entire business model is built around taking advantage of the openness of thousands of Free Software developers.
Does Red Hat contribute back to communities yes but does it contribute back in a reasonable proportion with the profit it makes profiting of the open source community and it's contributors well that is an material for an entire news article *wink* *wink* *nudge* *nudge*
Posted Dec 15, 2020 14:45 UTC (Tue)
by paulj (subscriber, #341)
[Link] (34 responses)
There are many companies at this, by various means. Some directly exploitative, taking free software of others and selling it with improvements they do not release back (or release only with great delay), and/or even with portions they will never release the code for. Others indirectly exploitative, by taking free software of others and profiting from it but - as you point at - largely not contributing back with support (employment, say) for those who supplied them with the software.
I think we need next-generation copyleft licences, to address this. Licenses that give users their freedom, but that also empower the actual authors of Free Software and shield the authors better from the parasitical tendencies of corporations - which the current GPL allows.
Posted Dec 15, 2020 17:52 UTC (Tue)
by mpr22 (subscriber, #60784)
[Link] (32 responses)
Those are violations of the GPL, and thus tortious (or even criminal) conduct for which the exploiter can be pursued by the copyright holder in a court of law.
(Yes, this is expensive. No, that expensiveness is not something that can be remedied by redrafting the licence on your software. Fixing that requires the assistance of legislators, not just lawyers.)
Posted Dec 15, 2020 19:09 UTC (Tue)
by paulj (subscriber, #341)
[Link] (31 responses)
There is at least one company who a) I know has improvements to software I have helped write; b) State they discharge their GPL obligations by giving the source to their customers with their binaries (i.e., they do not avail of the "offer to any 3rd party" clause in the GPL); d) Yet we never ever could get these improvements. I don't want to go into too much detail, but I strongly suspect side-contracts must be in place that penalise any of their customers if they publish or further distribute these changes to the GPL software.
Another example is the rise of large "cloud" companies, which are not in the business of distributing software. They are massive users of Free Software, and they often make fixes and improvements to that Free Software - but they are under no obligation to give those changes back, as they do not distribute. Some are good, and give back; others view these changes as a competitive advantage and are secretive even about what changes they made - never mind giving the changes back!
I would like a copyleft that completely barred private discharge of the source obligation to solve the first issue, and the second issue seems to me like it could only be fixed with some kind of clause requiring that modifications be made public, based on some reasonable condition to avoid requiring every speculative or dead-end change to have to be made public. E.g., perhaps require that any modifications that are put into use be made available publicly, always.
As for addressing expense, from talking to legal types, I think there may be non-legislative changes to licence text that could be made to make it easier to take action against violaters. E.g., in a number of jurisdictions one can only claim for demonstrable damages, so a licence that explicitly specified a monetary cost for use outwith the copyleft terms (e.g., X% of revenue of any controlling entity of the violator?) could make the licence easier to enforce. This could be done with a meta-licence, I guess - but it would be more universal and less hassle/confusing for developers if it was specified in the same licence.
Posted Dec 15, 2020 20:50 UTC (Tue)
by Wol (subscriber, #4433)
[Link] (30 responses)
Note that their claim (b) - if true - IS a full and complete discharge of their responsibilities. The GPL does NOT entitle random 3rd parties (including other copyright holders) to request copies of other peoples' source.
It entitles CUSTOMERS to receive a copy of the source. If that copy is not provided when customers receive the binary it is *then* that the "random 3rd party" rule kicks in on the assumption that the original customer may have further distributed the binaries.
And you could well be right with your suspicions in (d), but I suspect that is a breach of neither the letter nor the spirit of the GPL :-(
Cheers,
Posted Dec 15, 2020 22:35 UTC (Tue)
by paulj (subscriber, #341)
[Link] (24 responses)
I think by banning wholly private discharge of the source code distribution obligation. I.e., I would want a licence that obliges the GPL licensee to make the source available to all, if to any, always.
Posted Dec 15, 2020 23:31 UTC (Tue)
by Wol (subscriber, #4433)
[Link] (19 responses)
Which is COMPLETELY AGAINST the spirit of the GPL.
The whole point of the GPL is to protect *users* against an *abusive upstream*. You are said upstream. The GPL is there to protect your users *against you*. Sorry.
Cheers,
Posted Dec 16, 2020 0:05 UTC (Wed)
by paulj (subscriber, #341)
[Link] (18 responses)
The GPL does not exist to allow parasitic corporations to exploit Free Software developers, taking their code and making money of it with effectively-proprietary modifications to their customers, restricting the distribution of those modifications through side-contracts.
If you think those corporations need protecting, we're just going to have fundamentally disagree. And I think you're no friend of Free Software.
Posted Dec 16, 2020 0:26 UTC (Wed)
by Wol (subscriber, #4433)
[Link] (17 responses)
You clearly don't understand what the Free Software Foundation thinks is "Free Software", nor what is the intent of the GPL.
The GPL has NEVER been a "friend of the software developer" - if that's what you want you need the BSD licence.
I repeat - that corporation is your *downstream* *user*. The GPL is there to protect *downstream*!
Cheers,
Posted Dec 16, 2020 10:32 UTC (Wed)
by paulj (subscriber, #341)
[Link] (16 responses)
I really do not care about the interests of such parasites, and I'd like to find a copyleft licence that discourages such parasites, to the benefit of the rest of the community.
And I don't see a problem with a copyleft licence protecting the interests of Free Software developers, as long as it still protects the freedom of users.
Posted Dec 16, 2020 11:57 UTC (Wed)
by pizza (subscriber, #46)
[Link] (13 responses)
As Wol pointed out, "parasitic corporations" are still "users", so what you are saying is that "I want some uses/users to have more rights/freedoms than others".
Posted Dec 16, 2020 12:16 UTC (Wed)
by paulj (subscriber, #341)
[Link] (12 responses)
The GPL already excludes users who want to keep modifications they distribute to others proprietary. The problem is that some corporates have found a way to /effectively/ keep their modifications proprietary, while (arguably) staying technically within the law - by placing their restrictions on /other/ users in side-contracts.
These users are already outside of the spirit of the GPL, as far as I'm concerned. They are taking freedoms away from others. I have no time or sympathy for them. I will be glad to see that loophole closed off in future copyleft licences.
Posted Dec 16, 2020 12:24 UTC (Wed)
by paulj (subscriber, #341)
[Link] (9 responses)
If you're a Free Software developer that things there should be /no/ restriction on freedoms for users, then go and use a BSD licence. You (and your users) won't get the benefits that copyleft can bring. And that's a subjective decision, and that's fine.
Posted Dec 16, 2020 16:41 UTC (Wed)
by Wol (subscriber, #4433)
[Link] (8 responses)
You quite clearly have never bothered to read the GPL properly. The pre-amble states that yes, it does place obligations ON THE DEVELOPERS. The following is taken from clause 0 of the GPLv2
> Activities other than copying, distribution and modification are not covered by this License; they are outside its scope. The act of running the Program is not restricted, and the output from the Program is covered only if its contents constitute a work based on the Program (independent of having been made by running the Program). Whether that is true depends on what the Program does.
While this does not explicitly cover the case of some one/thing who is both a downstream and an upstream, I think it is quite clear that the intent of this section (and of the rest of the licence) is to re-iterate the fact that downstream owes NO OBLIGATION WHATSOEVER to upstream. This is the - intentional - reversal of the normal state of affairs where downstream needs permission from upstream to do anything even as little as wiping its nose despite paying through its nose for the privilege...
That's why I said "if you want freedom FOR THE DEVELOPERS you need the BSD licence". The GPL frees your users from any obligation to you. If you don't like it, tough, that's what it is intended to achieve.
Cheers,
Posted Dec 16, 2020 17:13 UTC (Wed)
by paulj (subscriber, #341)
[Link] (7 responses)
The intent of the GPL is to ensure the downstream has all the rights its upstream received. That is, the downstream /must/ be free to be able to distribute the changes onward. And that includes back to the original source!
I.e. the original upstream can *also* be a further-downstream - the benefits of Free Software are intended to extend to the original developer, as much as to any other users. It's a two-way street (but the parasites want to skew that street to themselves). So you are just wrong that the upstream-and-downstream has no obligation to its upstream, for the whole idea of copyleft is that a downstream of that upstream-and-downstream ought to be able to supply the changes back to the original upstream, and hence make the original upstream a downstream of the upstream-and-downstream as well as an upstream.
Copyleft intended to guarantee that freedom for the "downstream", by imposing obligations on the "upstream-and-downstream" intermediary - which reduce the freedom of that "upstream-and-downstream" inter-mediary.
That some think they have a found a way to prevent their downstreams from exercising the rights that the original upstream - the copyright holder - wanted all downstreams to be able to exercise, is a problem that I would like to see fixed.
The BSD isn't useful here to the original upstream. The BSD licence has its uses, but this scenario isn't one of them.
Posted Dec 16, 2020 17:30 UTC (Wed)
by pizza (subscriber, #46)
[Link] (5 responses)
"ought to be able" is not the same as "must"
> That some think they have a found a way to prevent their downstreams from exercising the rights that the original upstream - the copyright holder - wanted all downstreams to be able to exercise, is a problem that I would like to see fixed.
For what it's worth, I agree with you. I just don't think this addressable/fixable from within the scope of a copyright license.
Ultimately this is a question of freedom of association -- "Sure, you're completely free to pass on these modified GPL sources; that's your right. But if you do that, I'll exercise my right to stop doing business with you."
Posted Dec 16, 2020 17:41 UTC (Wed)
by paulj (subscriber, #341)
[Link] (4 responses)
They should just not be able to use it to prevent others from exercising their copyleft rights to distribute. And that can be done easily by just making it a general requirement (with reasonable exceptions to address ability to do R&D in private, desert island residents and dissidents) to make source available, so that it ceases to be a tool to control others with.
In this day of a plethora of places that will host Free Software source for free, it's easy to make code available, and it's reasonable to generally require those who modify Free Software to do so.
Posted Dec 16, 2020 17:54 UTC (Wed)
by pizza (subscriber, #46)
[Link] (2 responses)
Private contracts are used to place far more onerous conditions on things far more basic and important than copyleft software; what makes software so special here?
For example, as part of my severance package from the last gig, there was an anti-disparagement clause. If I trashed-talked my former employer within a certain period of time, I'd have to return the money they paid me. I was free to say no, and trash my employer all I wanted, but instead I voluntarily entered into a contract that restricted my freedom of speech and used that money to pay off some debts.
Should this "Waiving my rights to X in exchange for certain considerations" sort of contract be made illegal? (if yes, why? If no, how X == free speech materially different from "X == redistribution of copyleft software"?)
Posted Dec 17, 2020 12:26 UTC (Thu)
by paulj (subscriber, #341)
[Link] (1 responses)
The copyright holder can't stop others exercising their freedom of association either.
The copyright holder can however require that the obligation to distribute modifications to the source be broader, such that others can not wield freedom of association as a weapon to restrict copyleft rights.
And if such parasitic companies don't like that, they're still perfectly free to not use that software. The authors are free to choose their licence for their software, and others are free to make their own decisions.
Posted Dec 17, 2020 13:20 UTC (Thu)
by pizza (subscriber, #46)
[Link]
Oh, yes it does; if I make use of or incorporate certain software in my last two jobs, I can be terminated on the spot.
> The copyright holder can't stop others exercising their freedom of association either.
Their attempts to create "ethical licenses" certainly do; under "field of use restrictions"
> The copyright holder can however require that the obligation to distribute modifications to the source be broader, such that others can not wield freedom of association as a weapon to restrict copyleft rights.
The actual "software" has no rights or permissions -- only "persons" do. I (or my employer), as a "person", have the permission granted by the software's author (ie the license) to redistribute that copyleft software. I can chose not to do so for any reason -- Because I don't like you. Because it's Tuesday. Because I promised my mother that I wouldn't. Because I signed a contract with my employer/supplier/whatever to not do so. And so forth.
What you are asking is for the license to unconditionally force/compel folks to redistribute the software to unrelated third parties. There are significant practical and legal problems with that. I'm not saying it's impossible, just that it's going to take a lot of care to draft, and the resulting license will probably see even less use than the AGPL -- Which is already considered so toxic that it's only significant use is as a deliberate poison pill.
Posted Dec 16, 2020 20:24 UTC (Wed)
by Wol (subscriber, #4433)
[Link]
And you are showing your inability to follow a logical argument. If I rely on that company's software (never mind that some of it is your GPL software), I cannot afford for *them* to follow *their* right to freedom of association, and refuse to associate with me.
I have entered into a - supposedly mutual - beneficial arrangement with them, and neither of us wishes to jeopardise it. You are an outsider to that agreements, and by agreeing to the GPL you surrendered any rights you may have had. If you don't like it, it's your right to refuse to associate with the GPL.
It is a fundamental requirement of the free market, that people are not coerced into doing business with people they would rather avoid. This is what's wrong with modern "free market" capitalism, where the big players are free to buy, force out of business, or otherwise destroy their smaller competitors and force customers to do business with them. In this particular case, unfortunately that company does not want to do business with you, and their customers do not want to antagonise them.
YOU SAID the GPL requires you to pass on all the rights you received. But you are objecting to this company exercising those self-same rights that you received and passed on.
Cheers,
Posted Dec 16, 2020 19:21 UTC (Wed)
by Wol (subscriber, #4433)
[Link]
And that includes the freedom NOT to distribute changes back to the original source.
You're arguing with your heart, not your head. And that way leads to disaster ... "The road to hell is paved with good intentions". You've already assumed (from no evidence whatsoever) that I am opposed to what you want. I'm not. Just like many other people here, my head tells me you can't have it. Doesn't mean I don't wish we could :-)
"Man proposes. Nature opposes". What you want is not achievable. Not without tying logic up in a granny knot and bashing it over the head with a rolling pin.
Cheers,
Posted Dec 16, 2020 16:27 UTC (Wed)
by Wol (subscriber, #4433)
[Link] (1 responses)
So you want to discriminate between users - which is FORBIDDEN by the *concept* of copyleft. You won't - can't - find a copyleft licence that agrees with you. (Oh - and as I pointed out - the GPLv3 not only did not attempt to close that loophole, it quite deliberately opened it even wider!)
And those same users you have no sympathy for includes a LOT of hardware vendors - if you hadn't noticed, a lot of kernel developers feel similarly to you. The *problem* is that, as soon as you have the sort of licence *you* desire, the practical consequence will be that linux is sidelined and becomes completely irrelevant.
Sadly, sometimes practicality has to trump idealism, or the idealists will become irrelevant sighing winds in the desert :-(
Cheers,
Posted Dec 16, 2020 16:53 UTC (Wed)
by paulj (subscriber, #341)
[Link]
Some users think they've found a loophole, that is against the spirit of the GPL and copyleft. (And I completely disagree with you that the spirit of copyleft /intentionally/ allows for corporates to restrict re-distribution of modifications by their downstreams - that's absurd, the entire point of copyleft is to ensure the recipients get the right to distribute!).
I don't get your point about hardware vendors. If you mean the likes of graphics vendors with closed blobs, they may well be in direct violation of the GPL already - that's not the case I'm talking about.
I sense I'm down a rabbit hole with you.
Posted Dec 16, 2020 13:04 UTC (Wed)
by mpr22 (subscriber, #60784)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Dec 16, 2020 13:23 UTC (Wed)
by paulj (subscriber, #341)
[Link]
So I'd be happy to exempt natural persons from some obligations designed to tackle an issue that manifests itself mostly with corporations. If a reasonable balance of obligations and wording can be found that doesn't need to distinguish between natural persons and other bodies, that's fine too.
Posted Dec 16, 2020 1:08 UTC (Wed)
by pabs (subscriber, #43278)
[Link] (3 responses)
Posted Dec 16, 2020 1:31 UTC (Wed)
by bkuhn (subscriber, #58642)
[Link]
The issue of mandatory upstream distribution of source changes to copylefted software has been a hotly debated topic since I first got involved in copyleft licensing policy and drafting in the late 1990s. The two primary positions within this debate have been outlined well already in this thread. I think most copyleft theorists believe that modifiers (modulo the danger situations with dissidents that pabs identified) have a moral obligation to make generally useful improvements available to the general public. The problem, and this goes back to the points pabs raised, is how to draft policy that respects the privacy rights of some types of modifications while assuring that truly generally useful changes that the world deserves, morally speaking, can be codified into a copyleft license.
Much of this debate reminds me more recently of the so-called “Ethical License” initiatives. In those initiatives, its proponents argue that since there are immoral things done by companies with software (such as helping USA's ICE lock children up in cages) that the licenses are not ethical if they don't prevent that.
The flaw in the logic is the idea that every moral and social problem that relates to software can be fixed with its license. Having spent years enforcing copyleft licenses and drafting them, I've concluded that you have to be selective how you use the tool of copyleft. And, it's not that I'm just critical of new ideas: I'd argue that GPLv2§2(a) is a great example of a well-intentioned clause meaning to get to a good policy outcome that is just annoying to comply with in practice. We should all comply with it because it's required, but I would never include that clause or one like it again in a future copyleft license.
Similarly, when I hear people clamoring for features for copyleft licenses, I worry about future-proofing. It's hard to do. Anyway, I encourage anyone who wants to talk about real-world drafting of copyleft to join the copyleft-next project.
Posted Dec 16, 2020 10:38 UTC (Wed)
by paulj (subscriber, #341)
[Link] (1 responses)
The obligation to distribute generally could be to the greatest extent reasonable, subject to any external restrictions on distribution. So the desert island denizen, as long as they make available to anyone else on the island, would be fine.
The dissident can be protected by exempting any person (not corporation) from the obligation, where doing so would put lives at risk of oppression.
Posted Dec 16, 2020 13:05 UTC (Wed)
by mpr22 (subscriber, #60784)
[Link]
Posted Dec 16, 2020 0:20 UTC (Wed)
by Wol (subscriber, #4433)
[Link] (4 responses)
Actually, version 3 of the GPL makes this intent even clearer - the wording of v2 effectively made the vendor *force* the source onto the user. Under v3, if the vendor merely makes the source *available* (by, for example, providing a download link) it stops the "random 3rd party" rule from kicking in.
In other words, if I point my users at a *private* *intranet* site, so long as they have access to said private site at the time I supply the binaries, then I can pull that source download site AT ANY TIME.
Cheers,
Posted Dec 25, 2020 19:12 UTC (Fri)
by sammythesnake (guest, #17693)
[Link] (3 responses)
Three years might be an interminable age or a blink of the eye depending on the circumstances, though.
Posted Dec 25, 2020 20:01 UTC (Fri)
by sfeam (subscriber, #2841)
[Link]
Posted Dec 27, 2020 1:13 UTC (Sun)
by Wol (subscriber, #4433)
[Link] (1 responses)
In other words, you must comply with clause 6, but you can choose between (a) or (b) (or (c) or (d) or whatever).
Cheers,
Posted Dec 27, 2020 1:16 UTC (Sun)
by Wol (subscriber, #4433)
[Link]
Comply with (a) OR (b) OR (c) OR (d) OR (e).
Your choice - if you want to ignore 6(b) that's perfectly fine so long as you comply with one of the others.
Sheesh - talk about people not being able to understand plain simple English ... (or American :-)
Cheers,
Posted Dec 15, 2020 20:48 UTC (Tue)
by joib (subscriber, #8541)
[Link]
> There are many companies at this, by various means. Some directly exploitative, taking free software of others and selling it with improvements they do not release back (or release only with great delay), and/or even with portions they will never release the code for. Others indirectly exploitative, by taking free software of others and profiting from it but - as you point at - largely not contributing back with support (employment, say) for those who supplied them with the software.
There are, of course, licenses which provide monetary compensation to the developers, but those are called proprietary, not open source. The universe is, for better or worse, under no obligation to give money to you or me as a reward for writing free software.
> I think we need next-generation copyleft licences, to address this. Licenses that give users their freedom, but that also empower the actual authors of Free Software and shield the authors better from the parasitical tendencies of corporations - which the current GPL allows.
In a way, I completely agree with that. GPLv3 is in many ways fine, but doesn't go nearly far enough to protect e.g. against service providers. But it also seems to me a quixotic quest. GPLv3, modest improvement to GPLv2 as it was, already caused a schism in the GPL-using community, many of which explicitly chose to stay with GPLv2-only. Not to mention AGPL, which is regarded as outright poison by many. And a hypothetical GPLv4 which would close the "service provide loophole", would probably look like an even stronger version of AGPLv3. I think very few would jump on that train.
The other approach is maybe to take a step back and think about what we're actually trying to achieve, and whether there are other more fruitful avenues to get what we want. If we want devices that we own, and can tinker with, maybe pushing for Right to Repair type legislation, including the ability to boot our own code instead of the manufacturer signed one? And push for open specified protocols, so we can replace the original manufacturer black box software with our own?
But those are more legal or political changes. Getting out in the street protesting, lobbying etc. is certainly uncomfortable, but OTOH maybe the alternative idea of enacting social change by coding away in our basements was always an impossible dream anyway.
Changing CentOS in mid-stream
Changing CentOS in mid-stream
Changing CentOS in mid-stream
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Wol
Changing CentOS in mid-stream
Changing CentOS in mid-stream
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Changing CentOS in mid-stream
Changing CentOS in mid-stream
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Changing CentOS in mid-stream
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Wol
Changing CentOS in mid-stream
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Wol
Changing CentOS in mid-stream
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Changing CentOS in mid-stream
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Mandatory upstream distribution and its problems
Changing CentOS in mid-stream
Changing CentOS in mid-stream
Changing CentOS in mid-stream
Wol
Changing CentOS in mid-stream
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Changing CentOS in mid-stream
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Changing CentOS in mid-stream