Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S1765648AbXFRSxG (ORCPT ); Mon, 18 Jun 2007 14:53:06 -0400 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id S1764457AbXFRSw4 (ORCPT ); Mon, 18 Jun 2007 14:52:56 -0400 Received: from mx1.redhat.com ([66.187.233.31]:54480 "EHLO mx1.redhat.com" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1764029AbXFRSwz (ORCPT ); Mon, 18 Jun 2007 14:52:55 -0400 To: Anders Larsen Cc: Ingo Molnar , Alan Cox , Daniel Hazelton , Linus Torvalds , Greg KH , debian developer , david@lang.hm, Tarkan Erimer , linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org, Andrew Morton Subject: Re: Dual-Licensing Linux Kernel with GPL V2 and GPL V3 References: <1182156596l.29108l.0l@ecxwww1.reanet.de> From: Alexandre Oliva Organization: Red Hat OS Tools Group Date: Mon, 18 Jun 2007 15:52:26 -0300 In-Reply-To: <1182156596l.29108l.0l@ecxwww1.reanet.de> (Anders Larsen's message of "Mon\, 18 Jun 2007 10\:49\:56 +0200") Message-ID: User-Agent: Gnus/5.11 (Gnus v5.11) Emacs/22.0.990 (gnu/linux) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Content-Length: 1924 Lines: 44 On Jun 18, 2007, Anders Larsen wrote: > On Sat, 16 Jun 2007 22:54:56 -0300, Alexandre Oliva wrote: >> I don't know any law that requires tivoization. > Not exactly laws, but pretty close: > Credit-card payment terminals are subject to strict security > certification, where it has to be ensured that > a) the user cannot tinker with the device without rendering it unusable > for its original purpose (electronic payments), and I think GPLv3 has that covered: Network access may be denied when the modification itself materially and adversely affects the operation of the network or violates the rules and protocols for communication across the network. I've been sufficiently annoyed by credit card transactions that cannot be completed for network-down reasons that I believe such devices depend on network access to perform the original purpose, and even though IANAL I think that cutting off network access in case the software no longer complies with the regulations is permitted by the license. > b) the manufacturer is able to update the device _in_ _the_ _field_. If the above is not enough, you could always use ROM. Sure, if you can replace the ROM, so can the user, and this just goes to show how short-sighted the alleged prohibitions on user tinkering with the software are. Sure, it would be more costly, but it's not like the law (or the agreements in place) *mandate* tivoization. -- Alexandre Oliva http://www.lsd.ic.unicamp.br/~oliva/ FSF Latin America Board Member http://www.fsfla.org/ Red Hat Compiler Engineer aoliva@{redhat.com, gcc.gnu.org} Free Software Evangelist oliva@{lsd.ic.unicamp.br, gnu.org} - 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/