From the lawyers I've spoken to about this, Linus's view on the GPL and the chosen enforcement strategy has long been known to be nonsense. But nothing will change as long as the kernel developers are intentionally burying their head in the sand and acting like they know better than the legal system.
onphonenow|3 years ago
Especially if my approach has single handedly created the largest body of copyleft / collaborative / open source software out there with massive amounts of actual collaboration.
The irony is so strong here. Basically jerks, who can't get along with others (including each other, witness the battles between SFC and SFLC etc etc) with little value creation themselves want to force their view on others, even though folks have already voted with their feet.
By all means create the Affero GPLv3. Try to get folks to write software for it. That's fine.
But don't pretend to be on some moral high ground speaking for developers / creators who wrote the code. Let them speak for themselves. And don't go back and having lost the effort to get Affero GPLv3 or whatever adopted close the various SAAS and Tivo loopholes, go back and say some old license has these terms.
HWR_14|3 years ago
The exact same authority developers have when they tell their clients that they cannot run a 1,000,000 person site off the phone they forget to charge sometimes. Or even a designer telling a client their color scheme is poor (it clashes, isn't color-blind friendly, and renders poorly on anything smaller than a tablet)! It's a technical matter and they are paid SMEs.
They aren't saying Linus's goals are stupid. They're saying the methods he's using to achieve the goals are. Which makes sense. Because he's not a lawyer.
seoaeu|3 years ago
This is like saying “If I want to write my code a certain way, what right do compiler authors and language designers have to tell me code contains ‘syntax errors’ and ‘obvious bugs’”. On some level you can write whatever code you want. But if you want it to work the way you intend, there’s some rules that have to be followed
jcranmer|3 years ago
The first part of the statement--if you want to license your code a certain way--your lawyer should be to work with you to find a way to legally do that. Unless you want something patently absurd like "I want a way to let me murder any idiots who use my code without any consequences whatsoever."
It's the parenthetical that's problematic: you can't control how the law will be interpreted, and if you've got an incorrect interpretation of the law, you'll be laughed out of the courtroom. See, for example, any sovereign citizen case.
throwaway82652|3 years ago
Are you willing to represent yourself in court? If the answer is no, then that's an admission you are stupider than a lawyer when it comes to legal matters. Nothing wrong with it, I have no problem admitting it myself. Let the programmers handle the programming and let the lawyers handle the law.
mistrial9|3 years ago
could any statement be less substantiated than pure FUD like that?