Should we drop the "or later" after GPLv2?

Rob Landley rob at landley.net
Thu Aug 24 17:29:35 UTC 2006


On Wednesday 23 August 2006 8:27 pm, Glenn L McGrath wrote:
> All im saying that a future licence may be better than the current one,
> and for practical reasons linux (kernel) is locked out of using that
> future license.
> 
> Its not just about GPLv3 either, in theory there may be legal reasons
> why a GPLv4 is desired.

I'm aware that the "or later" covers a GPLv4 as well.  But if GPLv3 doesn't 
fix whatever issues they have, I say screw it.

No matter what license we have, there may always be reasons a new one is 
desired.  What we have right now is "we're under whatever license the FSF 
decides to put out in future", but we will NEVER DROP GPLv2.  So whatever new 
terms those impose that are not implsed by GPLv2 will never be enforceable on 
BusyBox code, it can only REMOVE requirements.

And if GPLv2 becomes unworkable, the Linux kernel breaks, and that's a much 
bigger problem.  At this point, the multi-billion dollar server and embedded 
industries are likely to lobby for changes in the law to preserve GPLv2 
viability rather than say "Oh well, so that was Linux eh?  Fun while it 
lasted."

So what exactly is wrong with BusyBox being under the same license as the 
Linux kernel (which has been the case for its entire history up until now)?  
What does this hedge accomplish?  "Oh no, the FSF will save us from imagined 
slights by fixing what isn't broken."

Rob

P.S.  I was lobbying for a GPLv2.1 with a patent pool clause five years ago.  
Linas Veptas shopped variants of some of my proposals around on the Gnome 
lists a couple years back.  But the FSF didn't want to do that, they wanted 
to bundle in a dozen unrelated issues about application service providers and 
digital rights management, and I want no part of it.

The Open Innovation Network is trying to handle the patent issue with a real 
patent pool that actually has patents in it, which is better than attaching a 
rider to a _copyright_ license (that makes clear it's not a contract and thus 
informed consent and privity of contract don't block it from operating) 
trying to address patents (which are a separate area of law, as are 
trademarks, trade secrets, and that funky niche thing having to do with chip 
masks).  GPLv3 won't help the kernel anyway, which is the big target.  And it 
won't help _us_ if we're still dual-licensed under GPLv2 since whoever's 
suing doesn't have to agree to GPLv3, just GPLv2.

The FSF refused to deal with patents as a separate issue, they preferred 
log-rolling instead.  Sorry, but I'm really not inclined to swallow the 
amendments on an all-or-nothing basis.
-- 
Never bet against the cheap plastic solution.



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