Re: Kernel Firmware issue: are GPLed sourceless firmwares legal to distribute ?
On Wed, 18 Oct 2006, Roberto C. Sanchez wrote:
> On Tue, Oct 17, 2006 at 07:07:00PM -0700, Don Armstrong wrote:
> > On Tue, 17 Oct 2006, Roberto C. Sanchez wrote:
> > > So what? Distributing GPL works *with* sources is also not clear of
> > > legal liability.
> >
> > Those liabilities occur in either case, so they're not particularly
> > interesting to discuss. Doing something that is against the letter and
> > spirit of a software license is just not a position that we should put
> > ourselves in.
> >
> But they are interesting.
Interesting in a theoretical aspect perhaps, but not at all relevant
to the instant discussion.
> The original argument was about sourceless firmware. Consider these
> two cases:
>
> 1. distributing firmware without corresponding sources
> 2. distributing packages and source code to a patented implementation of
> something
These are two separate cases. The analogous case would be 2) without
distributing source and 2) as you currently have it.
Regardless, that distribution in compliance with relevant licenses
doesn't necessarily absolve you of all liabilities is well known, and
not an issue I'm terribly intersted in discussing in the abstract.
[And if for some reason it was readable into my initial response, that
was definetly not the intention.]
Don Armstrong
--
If a nation values anything more than freedom, it will lose its
freedom; and the irony of it is that if it is comfort or money it
values more, it will lose that, too.
-- W. Somerset Maugham
http://www.donarmstrong.com http://rzlab.ucr.edu
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