diff --git a/enforcement-case-studies.tex b/enforcement-case-studies.tex index f2e1f87..45f6704 100644 --- a/enforcement-case-studies.tex +++ b/enforcement-case-studies.tex @@ -117,6 +117,96 @@ will also find the course very helpful. %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% \chapter{Overview of FSF's GPL Compliance Lab} +The GPL is a Free Software license with legal teeth. Unlike licenses like +the X11-style or various BSD licenses, GPL (and by extention, the LGPL) is +designed to defend as well as grant freedom. We saw in the last course +that GPL uses copyright law as a mechanism to grant all the key freedoms +essential in Free Software, but also to ensure that those freedoms +propogate throughout the distribution chain of the software. + +\section{Termination Begins Enforcement} + +As we have learned, the assurance that Free Software under GPL remains +Free Software is accomplished through various terms of GPL: \S 3 ensures +that binaries are always accompanied with source; \S 2 ensures that the +sources are adequate, complete and usable; \S 6 and \S 7 ensures that the +license of the software is always GPL for everyone, and that no other +legal agreements or licenses trump GPL; \S 4 ensures that the GPL can be +enforced. + +In fact, \S 4 is where we begin our discussion of GPL enforcement. This +clause is where the legal teeth of the license are rooted. As a copyright +license, GPL governs only the activities governed by copyright law --- +copying, modifying and redistributing computer software. Unlike most +copyright licenses, GPL gives wide grants of permission for engaging with +these activities. Such permissions continue and all parties may exercise +until such time as one party violates the terms of GPL\@. At the moment +of such a violation --- the engaging of copying, modifying or +redistributing in ways not permitted by GPL --- \S 4 is invoked. + +Specifically, \S 4 terminates the violators rights to continue engaging +in the permissions that otherwise granted by GPL\@. Effectively, their +permission go back to the copyright defaults --- no permission to copy, +modify, or redistribute the work. Meanwhile, \S 5 points out that if +if the violator has no rights under GPL --- as they will not once they +have violated it --- then they otherwise have no right and are prohibited +by copyright law from engaging in the activities of copying, modifying +and distributing. + +\section{Ongoing Violations} + +In conjuction with \S 4's termination of violators' rights, there is one +final industry fact is added to the mix: rarely, does on engage in a +single, solitary act of copying, distributing or modifying software. +Almost always, a violator will have legitimately acquired a copy a GPL'd +program --- either made modifications or not --- and then begun a ongoing +activity of distributing that work. For example, the violator may have +put the software in boxes and sold them at stores. Or perhaps the +software was put up for download on the Internet. Regardless of the +delivery mechanism, violators almost always are engaged in {\em ongoing\/} +violation of GPL\@. + +In fact, when we discover a GPL violation that occured only once --- for +example, a user group who distributed copies of a GNU/Linux system without +source at a meeting once --- we rarely pursue it with a high degree of +dilligence. In our minds, that is an educational problem, and unless the +user group becomes a repeat offender (as it turns out, the never do) we +simply send an FAQ entry that best explains how user groups can most +easily comply with GPL, and send them on there merry way. + +It is only the cases of {\em ongoing\/} GPL violation that warrant our +active attention. We vehemently pursue those cases where dozens, hundreds +or thousands of customers are receiving software that is out of +compliance, and the company continually puts for sale (or distributes +gratis as a demo) software distributions that include GPL'd components out +of compliance. Our goal is to maximize the impact of enforcement and +educate industries who are making a mistake on a large scale. + +In addition, such ongoing violation shows that a particular company is +committed to a GPL'd product line. We are thrilled to learn that someone +is benefitting from Free Software, and we understand that sometimes they +have become confused about the rules of the road. Rather than merely +giving us a post mortem to perform on a past mistake, an ongoing violation +gives us an active opportunity to educate a new contributor the GPL'd +commons about proper procedures to contribute to the community. + +Our central goal is not, in fact, to merely clear up particular violation. +Over time, we hope that our compliance lab will be out of business. We +seek to educate the businesses that engage in commerce related to GPL'd +software to obey the rules of the road and allow them to operate freely +under them. Just as a traffic officer would not revel in reminding people +which side of the road to drive in, so we do not revel in violations. By +contrast, we revel in the successes of educating an ongoing violator about +GPL so that GPL compliance becomes a second-nature matter, and they join +the GPL ecosystem as contributors. + +\section{First Contact} + +The Free Software community is built on a structure of voluntary +cooperation and mutual help. + + + %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% \chapter{Case Study A} @@ -126,10 +216,28 @@ will also find the course very helpful. %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% \chapter{Case Study C} - %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% \chapter{Case Study D} +Reminder about how organizations themselves work. We don't have to +educate the organization, just call their attention to something. + +Working on DVD cases -- interested in the question on how one plays DVD +on one ligitimate owns, if one uses GNU/Linux give the licensing +structure of DVD content scrambling system. + +An article from the IBM guy who had arranged to have DVD player +application by a vendor for includsion with IBM distributed based T20s. + +They shimed the kernel, it was a GPL problem. + +Couple of weeks, we've looked into it, and we're going back to the +contractor and having them redo the thing to comply with GPL. + +contaminate a video output port with MacroVision. + +kernel mods + %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% \chapter{Good Practices for Compliance} %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%