Final Draft of GPLv3 Allows Novell-Microsoft Deal

famicommie writes "All of Novell's fingernail biting has been for naught. In a display of forgiveness and bridge building on behalf of the FSF, ZDNet reports that the final draft of the GPLv3 will close the infamous MS-Novell loophole while allowing deals made previously to continue. From the article: 'The final, last-call GPLv3 draft bans only future deals for what it described as tactical reasons in a 32-page explanation of changes. That means Novell doesn't have to worry about distributing software in SLES that's governed by the GPLv3 ... Drafting the new license has been a fractious process, but Eben Moglen, the Columbia University law school professor who has led much of the effort, believes consensus is forming. That agreement is particularly important in the open-source realm, where differing license requirements can erect barriers between different open-source projects.'"

Old news

[Cato]

This story is from 4th June... Another great bit of Slashdot editing.

Re:TiVo

[MadTinfoilHatter]

So does that mean TiVo can continue to sell their products because their deal was made before GPL3 was drafted?

The patent-deal issue, and the Tivoization issue are completely different topics. Furthermore TiVo can continue to sell their products for as long as they like, as long as they use GPLv2-licenced software - and the stuff that's already GPLv2 won't magically become v3 just because a new version is released. Only future releases will be affected for those projects that decide to go v3.

Re:TiVo

[SnowZero]

TiVo should be fine unless the Linux kernel is relicensed, which is not going to happen any time soon, if ever. Even then, they could always just fork off at the last GPL2 kernel release, as its not like they desperately need most updates (are they even on 2.6 yet?). Any other libraries/interfaces they use outside of the kernel should be LGPL or MIT/BSD, so they should be fine unless some critical program/daemon they need to run becomes GPL3 only. I guess if that happens its time to adopt a BSD userspace.

Re:Foolish

[Chandon Seldon]

It's actually an evil scheme on the part of the FSF to get Microsoft to distribute GPLv3 software, thus taking away their ability to make patent threats. Further, the Novell-Microsoft deal looks to be mostly harmful in practice - that sort of deal is horribly problematic in theory, but in this particular case it's worth more to the community to yell "Bad Dog" really loud rather than to sucker punch them.

summary is wrong

[DJProtoss]

The text the article is referring to is unchanged since the earlier drafts, and it certainly doesn't get novell off the hook wrt the linked article - Microsoft may still well have to lean on them to stop them shipping gplv3 code - since the use of the coupons, whilst existing as an effect of the patent agreement, will cause, when useed, a new contract between the coupon issuer [microsoft and novell] and the redeemer [joe bloggs] to be created at the date of redemption. If the code joe bloggs recieves contains gpl3'd code, then under the current draft (and as indicated in tfa) any patent protection indemities offered by that contract will automatically be extended to everybody. Thats why there was the fuss after poeple noted there isn't an expiry date on the coupons - up till that point it was thought they would all be gone by the time gplv3 was out and suse would be fine. Conclusion: either the summariser is misinformed or a turfer. for further info, go have a browse through groklaw [groklaw.net]. They have had pretty good coverage of it.

Re:Compromised

[Chandon Seldon]

What's the tactical reason?

Tactics are exactly the answer here - the FSF has a history of making tactical compromises. The FSF's process has no more been compromised over this than it was when they decided to release the LGPL and license GNU libc under it.

Doesn't exempt, though

[Todd Knarr]

All the GPLv3 language does is make merely having entered into the deal not per se a violation of the license. It does not exempt the company from any of the other terms of the license, including the requirement that all recipients receive not merely the protections resulting from any agreement but the right to pass along those protections in turn. So Novell is still on the hook there: as soon as they're faced with GPLv3'd software in their distribution they'll have to decide whether or not they can extend the agreement with Microsoft to cover all Linux users, not just those who got their software directly from Novell. If they can't, then distribution subject to the agreement would still be a violation of the GPLv3 even with the grandfather clause in there.

Re:free

[fsmunoz]

From the BSD licence:

* * Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
* * Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in thedocumentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.

So, you must retain and must reproduce. Since you MUST do something, it isn't free, following the same logic.

Re:free

[TheCoelacanth]

You're forbidden to use copyrighted code in any application.