Theo de Raadt Responds to Linux Licensing Issues 455
bsdphx writes "While Theo may have a reputation of being "difficult" in some circles, this response to the recent relicensing controversy is thoughtful and well penned. Through this whole process I've learned some new things about both GPL and BSD licensing, and especially about combining the two."
Dual licensing interpretations (Score:5, Informative)
"some circles"? (Score:2, Informative)
Try, "publicly, he's an asshole and routinely uses ad hominem."
From discussion of the very issue [undeadly.org], Slightly more annoyed [undeadly.org], Pièce de résistance, FLAME ON! [undeadly.org]
Pretty funny to then read, further down in the thread:
Theo didn't make the initial post about the BSD violation. Theo could have chosen to respond quite publicly, but instead he chose to respond on the OpenBSD mailing list. He did not go nuclear. He is not openly attacking anyone. He isn't even making a big fuss out of this, users on both sides are. Neither did he claim the Linux developers of being thieves.
Alluding that Linux kernel developers "must have failed gradeschool because you can't read" (paraphrasing only slightly) on a public website isn't "publicly attacking someone"?
The man doesn't know when to keep his mouth shut or how to be civil. It looks like (thankfully) people in the OpenBSD project are telling him to shut the fuck up and let them handle things:
I stopped making public statements in the recent controversy because Eben Moglen started working behind the scenes to 'improve' what Linux people are doing wrong with licensing, and he asked me to give him pause, so his team could work.
Re:Just doesn't make sense (Score:5, Informative)
BSD allows you to use the code in your own project, your own project can be then redistributed with BSD code in it, however the BSD license cannot be removed from the BSD code. BSD code can be modified but the BSD license cannot be removed from the modified file either. It is not possible to add a new license to a BSD licensed file without permission of the original copyright holders.
However you can take BSD code, add it to your own project and distribute just the binaries of your project without giving any source code to anyone and it is not illegal under BSD. But BSD is a license and it cannot be legally removed from a licensed file.
GPL is about requiring derived code to be shared (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Just doesn't make sense (Score:1, Informative)
Remember that the dual license explicitly says the licenses do not both have to be followed. Only one does. It is trivial to become unbound from the BSD license in this scheme by following the GPL. Of course, if you follow the BSD license instead you can hide the source.
Re:Hmmm (Score:5, Informative)
http://marc.info/?l=openssh-unix-dev&m=1143162246
You can't get much direct than that. I suggest you visit the link and read the rest of his mail.
However... (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Just doesn't make sense (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Just doesn't make sense (Score:2, Informative)
Lets take a look at the current BSD license:
In english what this says:
If you strip the license out of the source it no longer grants you permission to distribute.
So where does that leave us?
There is NOTHING illegal about stripping out the BSD license!
It just voids the license.
Re:"some circles"? (Score:3, Informative)
The man doesn't know when to keep his mouth shut or how to be civil. It looks like (thankfully) people in the OpenBSD project are telling him to shut the fuck up and let them handle things:
I stopped making public statements in the recent controversy because
Eben Moglen started working behind the scenes to 'improve' what Linux
people are doing wrong with licensing, and he asked me to give him
pause, so his team could work.
Or rather, he was the FSF's lawyer until the release of the GPLv3, which he co-wrote. Now he's the head of the Software Freedom Law Center, but he's still closely associated with the FSF and the GPL.
Re:Dual licensing interpretations (Score:2, Informative)
There is no point in the original copyright holder BSD+GPL dual licensing anything because releasing the code under a BSD-style license would be sufficient (i.e. BSD-licensed code can be freely mixed with GPL code by third parties).
Re:Just doesn't make sense (Score:3, Informative)
Okay, lets be clear:
1) Someone wrote some code for OpenBSD, and licensed it with the BSD license.
2) The code is now allowable to be in OpenBSD, Linux, Windows, Solaris, cruise missiles.
3) Now, someone *could* insert their code and license it with anything, including GPL. Note however, the original code is still BSD, just the new GPL code is under GPL, hence dual licensed.
Then it goes to hell.
4) Someone then goes in and deletes the BSD license out of the source file. Now, linking with Linux is still allowed but linking with OpenBSD is shaky, Windows and cruise missiles is not allowed at all.
Here's the thing: DON'T DELETE SOMEONE'S LICENSE!!! Personally, if I was the writer of the file, I'd be much more pissed and would relicense it as commercial. But I'm just evil.
Oz
Re:Relicencing (Score:1, Informative)
He didn't have the authority to remove the other license without the permission of all the other parties.
Yes, he did. The GPL gave him that permission.
The license is do as you like, but the one thing that one must not do is remove the license.
No, he didn't use that license, so he's not bound by its terms. He used the other license, the GPL. That license doesn't require him to preserve the BSD license, it requires him to preserve the GPL license. While it's usual to preserve both in cases like this, it's not a license requirement.
The reason for the strong emotion on this one is that by removing the BSD license from the code, the person is in effect claiming to have written all of the code which it licenses.
Rubbish. That's what removing the copyright notice did. The copyright notice and the BSD license are two very distinct things, you seem to be mixing them up.
I would suggest that a removal of one license is a move to relicense it.
Then you would simply suggest wrong. He accepted the terms of a license that was provided by the copyright holders. The fact that there was an alternative license he could have chosen is irrelevant, he was under no obligation to accept that license. The fact that he removed that superfluous license is irrelevant, he was under no obligation to preserve it, according to the other license he was provided with by the copyright holders.
Dual license is a bit of a misnomer, as the license includes both
Where are you getting this nonsense? This is pure fantasy. There is no singular conglomerate license of BSD+GPL that requires you to preserve the choice for people you distribute to. There are two alternative licenses offered. He picked one. He is not subject to the other, nor to this fantasy conglomerate license you seem to have invented.
Re:Just doesn't make sense (Score:4, Informative)
Alan is either an ignoramus or lazy? If he took the time to look at each of the files patched he would have noticed that some parts of that driver are not dual licensed or GPL, in particular the ones I mentioned specifically.
Explanation enough for you?
Everybody crying "dual license" "dual license" is like a five year old child who's mother told him to sit on the sofa or play video games, but not eat cookies. When his mother catches him sitting on the sofa eating cookies he says "but you told me to sit on the sofa."
People need to grow up and recognize that Jiri did something illegal here and stop arguing half the situation because some of the files he modified were dual licensed.
Re:Just doesn't make sense (Score:3, Informative)
Consider qt from Trolltech. You distribute it with your app under an open source license. Someone who receives it from you can choose to distribute qt with the open source license or they can buy a commercial license from Trolltech and distribute it closed source. You can't stop them from doing that by changing the license to the terms you chose. You don't own the code so you don't have the right to make that kind of change.
Just because the BSD style licenses are less restrictive and considered "compatible" with the GPL doesn't mean that you can pretend they don't exist and remove them from code you didn't write even when dual licensed. It's an option for everybody not just you.
Now there's the question of your changes to the code. Those changes are yours and may or may not qualify for protection under copyright. If they don't qualify, for example all you did was add a '+ 1' to an expression involving ten terms, then your changes aren't protectable and you have absolutely zero say in how the aggregate work is licensed. If your changes are more substantial then you will be able to say "lines 1013 through 1165 of this file are distributed under the terms of the GPL. The rest of the file is available under the GPL or license B." But you can't take away the B option. It'd be interesting to know how much of the changes Jiri made to the driver are Linux glue and how much are actual improvements or additions. If it's just Linux glue then he probably has no real claim to controlling the licensing at all.
Re:Compiz/Beryl (Score:3, Informative)
I think I grok this (Score:3, Informative)
Secondly, the concept of community and sharing. Since both gpl and bsd have similar ideals (open the source), a certain amount of camaraderie and back scratching is nice. Each camp has similar goals. What pisses off the openbsd people in this case is that the gpl people acted in bad faith and removed a license illegally. Theo is 100% right about this.
If you want your work to be GPL only, separate it out and place under GPL only, and leave the dual licensed code alone, which would be legal. But as Theo says, this will reflect badly on the spirit of cooperation between the two license camps, and probably mean less inclination to support dual licenses in the future.
Re:Just doesn't make sense (Score:4, Informative)