6 ms·
This is the commonly recited argument but I don't believe it was ever proven to be legally necessary. Furthermore, even if it was, it's not clear what level of
by shawnz 7y ago
This is the commonly recited argument but I don't believe it was ever proven to be legally necessary. Furthermore, even if it was, it's not clear what level of integration is "too deep". So in practice, it's just a way for kernel developers to add political restrictions as they see fit.
- bcrosby95 7y agoProven legally necessary, as in, a court telling them to stop doing something? I'm pretty sure they don't want it to get to that point.
- shawnz 7y agoProven legally necessary, as in, a court ever telling anyone in that situation to stop doing it. Or even to start doing it in the first place. There's just no legal justification behind it whatsoever.
- teddyuk 7y agoSurely the kernel developers can do whatever the hell they like. If you don’t like that don’t use it.
- HorstG 7y ago"Proven" is a maybe impossible standard: Kernel devs hint at the GPLonly exports having been useful in certain cases they prefer not to discuss on a ML. https://lore.kernel.org/lkml/20190110131132.GC20217@kroah.com/ https://lore.kernel.org/lkml/20190110131132.GC20217@kroah.co... One can interpret this as something legally significant, or an embarrassing private anecdote, or nothing substantial at all, maybe even just talk. However, I'd give them the benefit of the doubt. Not the least since they could be the ones against Oracle's legal dept...
- shawnz 7y agoWhat he is referring to is the use of the GPL export restriction to strong-arm companies into releasing their code as GPL. It's nothing to do with a legal requirement, he is just an open source licensing hardhead. See: https://lwn.net/Articles/603145/ https://lwn.net/Articles/603145/