Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S932148AbWIYOML (ORCPT ); Mon, 25 Sep 2006 10:12:11 -0400 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id S932152AbWIYOMK (ORCPT ); Mon, 25 Sep 2006 10:12:10 -0400 Received: from stat9.steeleye.com ([209.192.50.41]:32184 "EHLO hancock.sc.steeleye.com") by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S932148AbWIYOMJ (ORCPT ); Mon, 25 Sep 2006 10:12:09 -0400 Subject: Re: GPLv3 Position Statement From: James Bottomley To: Michiel de Boer Cc: linux-kernel In-Reply-To: <451798FA.8000004@rebelhomicide.demon.nl> References: <1158941750.3445.31.camel@mulgrave.il.steeleye.com> <451798FA.8000004@rebelhomicide.demon.nl> Content-Type: text/plain Date: Mon, 25 Sep 2006 09:12:03 -0500 Message-Id: <1159193523.3463.14.camel@mulgrave.il.steeleye.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Evolution 2.2.3 (2.2.3-4.fc4) Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Content-Length: 1906 Lines: 38 On Mon, 2006-09-25 at 10:53 +0200, Michiel de Boer wrote: > For what it's worth, i support RMS and his fight for free software fully. > I support the current draft of the GPL version 3 and am very dissapointed > it will not be adopted as is. IMHO, Linux has the power and influence > to move mountains in the software industry, and shouldn't shy away from > the opportunity to take moral responsibility when it arises. Well ... as Russell already pointed out; adopting GPLv3 was made incredibly difficult for us by the FSF. We could easily adopt a GPLv2 compatible licence simply by going through some sort of process to secure agreement and then altering the COPYING file of the kernel (the point being that past contributions would still be v2, future contributions would be the new licence and there's no distribution problem because they're compatible). There are definite bug fixes to v2 in the v3 draft: Bittorrent and termination. However, we could adopt those in a v2 compatible fashion (as additional permissions). Additionally, it does strike me that a patent grant could be formulated in a v2 compatible manner if people agreed on it. Obviously, the additional restrictions of v3 is completely impossible to accommodate in a v2 compatible manner. The DRM provisions could be disputed: if you believe they're already in v2, then they could be adopted in a v2 compatible fashion as a clarification ... however, they'd have to be quite a bit less broad than the current v3 language. All in all, we could probably only switch to v3 by some type of universal acclamation process, which, with 28 votes against already isn't really likely. James - To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/