154 lines
8.2 KiB
HTML
154 lines
8.2 KiB
HTML
{% extends "base_compliance.html" %}
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{% block subtitle %}GPL Compliance Project For Linux Developers - {% endblock %}
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{% block submenuselection %}VMwareLawsuitFAQ{% endblock %}
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{% block content %}
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<h1>Frequently Asked Questions about Christoph Hellwig's VMware Lawsuit</h1>
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<p>Conservancy maintains this
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<abbr title="Frequently Asked Questions">FAQ</abbr> list regarding
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<a href="/news/2015/mar/05/vmware-lawsuit/">Christoph Hellwig's lawsuit against VMware
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in Germany over alleged GPL violations on Linux</a> as a service to the
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Free Software community, and in particular, the copyleft community. Conservancy
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realizes this lawsuit generates many questions and interest
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from the community. Legal counsel (both Conservancy's own, and
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Christoph's lawyer, Till Jaeger) correctly advise us to limit our public
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comments regarding specific details of the case while litigation remains
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pending in court. Nevertheless, Conservancy, as a
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non-profit charity serving the public good, seeks to be as transparent as
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possible. If you have additional questions you'd like to see answered
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here, please <a href="mailto:info@sfconservancy.org">email
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<info@sfconservancy.org></a>, but understand that we may often need
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to answer: <q>We cannot comment on this while litigation is pending</q>.</p>
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<dl>
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<dt>Who is the Plaintiff in the lawsuit?</dt>
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<dd>Christoph is one of most active developers of the Linux kernel. He has
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contributed 279.653 lines of code to the latest Linux 3.19 kernel, and
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thus ranks 20th amongst the 1,340 developers involved in that release.
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Christoph also ranks 4th among those who have reviewed third-party source
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code, tirelessly corrected and commented on other developers'
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contributions.</dd>
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<dt>Are the court documents released?</dt>
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<dd>Not currently. Court proceedings are not public by default in Germany
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(unlike in the USA). Conservancy will continue to update this FAQ with
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information that Conservancy knows about the case. We would all also
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welcome an agreement with VMware whereby both sides would agree to publish
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all Court documents. </dd>
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<dt>Who's funding this lawsuit?</dt>
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<dd>Conservancy has engaged in a grant agreement with Christoph Hellwig for
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the purposes of pursuing this specific legal action in Germany.
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Conservancy is funding this legal action specifically as part of
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Conservancy's program activity in
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its <a href="/linux-compliance/about.html">GPL Compliance
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Project for Linux Developers</a>.</dd>
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<dt>Is this the Great Test Case of Combined / Derivative Works?</dt>
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<dd>This case is specifically regarding a combined work that VMware
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allegedly created by combining their own code (“vmkernel”) with
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portions of Linux's code, which was licensed only under GPLv2. As such,
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this, to our knowledge, marks the first time an enforcement case is
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exclusively focused on this type of legal question relating to GPL.
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However, there are so many different ways to make combined and/or
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derivative works that are covered by GPL that no single case could possibly
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include all such issues. </dd>
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<dt>Why must you file a lawsuit? Isn't there any other way to convince
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VMware to comply with GPL?</dt>
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<dd><p>Neither Conservancy nor Christoph takes this action lightly nor without
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exhausting every other possible alternative first. This lawsuit is the
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outgrowth of years of effort to convince VMware to comply with GPL.</p>
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<p>In October 2011, Conservancy received a GPL violation report on
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BusyBox for VMware's ESXi products. Conservancy opened the matter in its
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usual, friendly, and non-confrontational way. Nevertheless, VMware
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immediately referred Conservancy to VMware's outside legal counsel in the
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USA, and Conservancy negotiated with VMware's legal counsel throughout
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late 2011, 2012 and 2013. We exchanged and reviewed CCS candidates, and
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admittedly, VMware made substantial and good efforts toward compliance on
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BusyBox. However, VMware still refused to fix a few minor and one major
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compliance problem that we discovered during the process. Namely, there
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was a major violation regarding Linux itself that ultimately became
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Christoph's key complaint in this lawsuit.</p>
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<p>Meanwhile, when Conservancy realized in late 2012 there might be a major
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Linux violation still present in VMware's ESXi products, Conservancy
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representatives sought every industry contact we had for assistance,
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including those from trade associations, companies (both competitors and
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collaborators with VMware), and everyone else we could think of who might be
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able to help us proceed with friendly negotiations that would achieve
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compliance. While we cannot name publicly the people we asked for help
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to convince VMware to comply, they include some of the most notable
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executives, diplomats, and engineering managers in the Linux community. No
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one was able to assist Conservancy in convincing VMware to comply with the
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GPL. Then, in early 2014, VMware's outside legal counsel in the USA finally
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took a clear and hard line with Conservancy stating that they would not
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comply with the GPL on Linux and argued (in our view, incorrectly) that they
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were already in compliance.</p>
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<p>Conservancy in parallel informed Christoph fully of the details of the
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Linux violation on Christoph's copyrights, and based on Conservancy's
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findings, Christoph began his own investigation and confirmed
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Conservancy's compliance conclusions. Christoph then began his own
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enforcement effort with legal representation from Till Jaeger. Christoph has
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been unable to achieve compliance, either, through his negotiations in
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2014. VMware's last offer was a proposal for a settlement agreement that VMware would
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only provide if Christoph signed an NDA, and Christoph chose (quite
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reasonably) not to sign an NDA merely to look at the settlement offer.</p>
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<p>Thus, this lawsuit comes after years of negotiations by Conservancy to
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achieve compliance — negotiations that ended in an outright refusal by
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VMware's lawyers to comply. Those events were then followed by a year of
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work by Christoph and Till to achieve compliance in a separate action.</p>
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<p>Simply put, Conservancy and Christoph fully exhausted every possible
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non-litigation strategy and tactic to convince VMware to do the right thing
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before filing this litigation.</p>
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</dd>
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<dt>Can you explain further how VMware incorporated code from Linux into
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their kernel?</dt>
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<dd>Conservancy prepared this diagram to show the technical situation as we
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understand it. The diagram compares the technical architecture of a full,
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running Linux kernel with a full, running VMware kernel:
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<p>
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<a href="/linux-compliance/linux-vs-vmkernel_en_scaled.png">
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<img alt="[Diagram of Linux and VMware running kernels" src="/linux-compliance/linux-vs-vmkernel_en_scaled.png" width="519" height="392" /></a>
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</p>
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<p>If you want to download the diagram, it's available
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in <a href="/linux-compliance/linux-vs-vmkernel_en.svg">SVG
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(English)</a>, <a href="/linux-compliance/linux-vs-vmkernel_en.png">PNG
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(English)</a>, <a href="/linux-compliance/linux-vs-vmkernel_de.svg">SVG
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(German)</a>, and <a href="/linux-compliance/linux-vs-vmkernel_de.png">PNG
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(German)</a>.</p>
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</dd>
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<dt>I care about copyleft and the GPL. How can I help?</dt>
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<dd>Conservancy needs <a href="#donate-box" class="donate-now">your immediate financial
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support to proceed with this litigation</a>. Litigation costs are
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unpredictable, and this lawsuit may take years to resolve. Conservancy is
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prepared to fund this case through its conclusion, but we can only do so
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with <a href="/supporter/"><em>your</em> support</a>. If you are an
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individual who supports copyleft and wants to see it defended, please
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donate now.</dd>
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<dt>Why is the case in Germany?</dt>
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<dd>Copyright infringement claims can be brought anywhere that distribution
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of the copyrighted works occur. VMware distributes ESXi throughout the
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world, but Germany is close to Christoph's home and his lawyer was
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available to do the litigation work there. Finally, historically,
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Mr. Jaeger's cases in Germany have usually achieved worldwide compliance on
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the products at issue in those cases.</dd>
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</dl>
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{% endblock %}
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