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Certainly; if you wrote the code and still hold copyright, you can license it under whatever terms you wish. You can GPL it, but then turn around and release a
by inklesspen 16y ago
Certainly; if you wrote the code and still hold copyright, you can license it under whatever terms you wish. You can GPL it, but then turn around and release a proprietary version. You have this right _if_ you're the copyright holder.
From what I can tell, the person who put this app on the App Store is not the copyright holder of GNU Go. (The FSF holds copyright to most of GNU Go's code, and they'd hardly offer an app on the App Store; and if they had, they could take it down without going through this mess.)
So what we have here is someone who took someone else's code (which was made available under GPL) and then released a DRMed version of it. The FSF is saying you don't get to do that.
- Vivtek 16y agoAs long as the code is available, I don't see why the DRM should matter. As noted elsewhere in this thread, it would be great if the FSF could provide a more detailed analysis of what the AppStore distribution is lacking. As it is, it seems this would just make developers more worried about the GPL.
- ElliotH 16y agoFrom what I understand, Apple is a distributor - not just the original developers. Because Apple is distributing they have the same responsibilities as any distributor to provide the source code and allow the code to be shared. And making people worried about the GPL shouldn't be a priority here. The GPL isn't a free-for-all license - its a very specific license which, while granting a lot of rights, also has a lot of requirements. Anybody distributing code with such a license needs to make sure they fall in line.
- voidpointer 16y agoIf the author of the app provided a link to a full source code download in the app itself and on the appstore page, wouldn't that make the whole thing compliant, at least in spirit, with the GPL? Everybody would be able to download the source, build/modify it themselves and run it in the emulator and if they have a developer certificate install it on their phone.
- dalore 16y agoAs it was said above, it's not the distribution that is the problem, it is the addition of license terms which the GPL forbids.