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John Deere's ongoing GPL violations: What's next
- firstlink 4y agoAfter two years, the SFC is escalating to "asking publicly". Wow, they really are great stewards of the copyrights which have been assigned to them!
- worik 4y agoThe legal system is glacial "Justice delayed, is justice denied " is supposed to be one of the principles of jurisprudence, it seems to have been forgotten
- tapoxi 4y agoHow is it glacial? This is resolved with a copyright infringement lawsuit. Filing the suit is entirely on them.
- worik 4y ago> How is it glacial? These cases take years In other parts of the (in)justice system people languish in jail, and on bail, waiting for their day in court. The legal systems of Western "democracies " have become a money fountain, and are loosing the sense of justice
- SllX 4y agoFiling a suit does not take years. If you know you have a case, decide if you’re going to sue, if yes, then you bang out the paperwork and file it with the appropriate court. Trying to fight what ought to be a lawsuit through PR isn’t going to get you any closer to an injunction or discovery but is a red flag that maybe the one engaging in the PR battle doesn’t feel confident they have a case. EDIT: I dug into it a little. SFC appears to be dug into a lawsuit against Vizio. It makes sense, even law firms have finite resources, and there’s some indication that the outcome of this lawsuit could give a clearer indication of the viability of a suit against John Deere. My original point on the time it takes to file a suit stands though.
- simoncion 4y ago> Filing a suit does not take years. Correct. Closing out the suit takes years. As was said: > These cases take years
- pabs3 4y agoA suit against John Deere is a lot harder in the way that the Vizio suit is being done (there they are suing as an end-user, a third-party beneficiary of the GPL contract), because you would have to be a Deere customer first (presumably that would cost more money than Conservancy's budget for the Vizio lawsuit) and if you do sue, maybe they stop selling you tractors or software updates or stop taking your phone calls. A regular copyright violation lawsuit might be a better option.
- kmeisthax 4y agoYes, but the endgame of the GPL is not to generate copyright infringement lawsuits[0]. It's to compel modifiers of the code to license their changes back and respect user freedom - i.e. to keep the software effectively uncopyrighted. If you sue in a court of law, they will give you money damages, and maybe an injunction specifically requiring the developer delete their copy of the program. Under no circumstances will a court demand specific performance of GPL obligations to release source code. But that's what the SFC wants. So the only way to get people to comply with the GPL is to use the threat of a lawsuit to encourage compliance. This is contrary to what we normally think of with copyright litigation, but that's mostly because the lawsuits we see are either breakdowns of negotiation, or against individual infringers and pirate sites that would never be granted a license under any circumstances whatsoever. When you want a licensee to actually do something, you are better off threatening litigation and negotiating rather than going straight to the nuclear option. [0] Nobody told that to the Lawnmower Man[1] unfortunately [1] Larry Ellison
- nier 4y agoDid you just anthropomorphize Larry Ellison?
- pabs3 4y agoMost of these violating companies don't care about lawsuits, the big ones could probably bankrupt anyone trying to sue them by dragging things out and the small ones just make a product, fold the company and start a new one. I found the latest Conservancy lawsuit interesting, they are suing as a third-party beneficiary of the GPL (ie as a recipient of GPL code), not as a copyright holder. They are suing solely for compliance, not for damages. Hopefully they get back their costs too though. https://sfconservancy.org/copyleft-compliance/vizio.html https://sfconservancy.org/copyleft-compliance/vizio.html
- zamalek 4y agoHow quickly does copyright get addressed when it comes to e.g. RIAA?
- ksherlock 4y agoThe RIAA filed a lawsuit against Napster in December 1999. A preliminary injunction to block RIAA music on Napster was granted in August, 2000. Napster appealed and the circuit court upheld the injunction in February 2001. The injunction was effective as of March 2001 and Napster shut down in July 2001. Some of the lawsuit was settled out of court in September 2001. Napster went bankrupt in September 2002. So that's 15 months for a slam-dunk injunction. Today it wouldn't take as long since there's case law backing them up. But if the RIAA had spent 2 years sending emails and writing blog posts, they wouldn't have gotten anywhere either.
- neilv 4y agoI'd prefer something a bit closer to the other end of the spectrum of defending open software licenses. The other end of the spectrum might be an outcome like "Some GPL library authors find themselves suddenly owning a major farming machinery company". :)
- elkos 4y agoMe too. If the risk of not adhering to a license is minimal, a for-profit organization has fewer incentives to do so. The US copyright law is draconian, copyright violations are felony violations with 10 years prison and 100k$ fines, the Aaron Swartz taught us that.
- pabs3 4y agoIt seems more likely that "Deere banned from putting Linux on their tractors" would be the outcome than that :)
- dan-robertson 4y agoHow far does it differ from the SfC’s stated attitude towards enforcement? I guess that they are behaving the way they said they would, and maybe you dislike that but you could at least have predicted it. Do they say they do something different?
- pabs3 4y agoThey are a small org with limited resources, so that isn't surprising. They do sue companies though, their most recent lawsuit (against Vizio), if they win, will also allow any recipient of GPLed code to sue for compliance. https://sfconservancy.org/copyleft-compliance/vizio.html https://sfconservancy.org/copyleft-compliance/vizio.html
- wmf 4y agoMost GPL violations are really minor and suing over them creates backlash that's worse than the original violation. So the reasonable path is to ask nicely and then... ask nicely in public.
- bacchusracine 4y agoAt this point it's starting to seem like the GPL was only ever a bluff and it's being called on us now.... As someone who uses Linux every day this hurts and makes me wonder what the future will be as hardware gets locked away from us with the very tools we made to use it.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- acedTrex 4y agoGPL has always been mostly a bluff, it's occasionally attempted to be enforced but its a drop in the bucket compared to the ocean of infringement.
- hospitalJail 4y agoThis gives me hope for using Arduino and LGPL. I want to make a product, I don't even mind giving away the code. I'm just worried since its an embedded system, its hard to update or whatever. As many times as I read the legal stuff, its over my head. I can't understand how you can let someone update part of the code on something compiled. Its not like I'm going to have a screen on my device to let users read the code either. If someone wants to fight a legal battle, its really due to my incompetence, not malice.
- LawTalkingGuy 4y agoFor [L]GPLv2 it's super simple - release any changed code and anything that links closely to it. If you publish all your source you basically can't fail to do this right. For GPLv3, it's that simple most of the time. You talk about embedded which suggests you may be thinking primarily of the "tivoization" clauses designed to prevent user lockout. Again, if you're a fully open source project this will be hard to fail because the user should be able to just copy whatever you do in development. It's when you try to prevent user updates while allowing your own that this applies.
- 4y ago
- fxtentacle 4y ago"Seems to be standard practice for Chinese companies" "Stop the sale of products that violate licenses in markets the US controls" It seems Xiaomi is in good company ;)
- user3939382 4y agoRelated, check out Rossmann’s new video on how they’ve corrupted the Farm Bureau that’s supposed to represent the farmers, and thereby got their lobby group to surreptitiously lobby against their own industry by killing meaningful provisions in right to repair. John Deere is a horrible company whose upper management needs to be wiped from the industry.
- WheatMillington 4y agoIt really does beg the question, if JD is so bad why do people keep buying them? Perhaps RTR just isn't as important to people as the tech crowd thinks.
- devwastaken 4y agoPatents. Intellectual property. You cannot make a tractor without JD's blessing. We do not live in a free market where you can just "make your own" and sell it.
- osigurdson 4y agoSeriously? The patent on a basic / home-made tractor must have expired by now. I suspect finding a buyer (not to mention making it) would be more challenging that the legal issues.
- ronsor 4y agoSpeaking generally and not just about RTR, people often recognize something is "wrong" and that they're negatively affected, but they also don't really understand what's going on, so they can't do much other than complain when they get screwed over.
- inetknght 4y ago> if JD is so bad why do people keep buying them Why do people keep buying Samsung or Apple when there are better products? They certainly don't respect the right to repair either. Likewise, people buy JD because it's a well-known brand. If you asked people what they wanted 100 years ago, they would say they wanted a faster horse. It's hard to advocate for something that people don't realize they don't have.
- burstmode 4y agoOK, so what exactly are the John Deere programs they think are a GPL violation ? There's no info about that in the article.
- kwiens 4y agoThere's more inforation in Sick Codes Jailbreak talk. https://www.fierceelectronics.com/sensors/sick-codes-jailbreaks-tractor-defcon-right-repair-move https://www.fierceelectronics.com/sensors/sick-codes-jailbre... The display is a full blown touchscreen GUI built using Linux and all sorts of OSS tools. The LTE gateway is another linux machine.
- abotsis 4y agoI think, even if for the pure marketing of it, one of Deere’s competitors should seize the opportunity to offer “open” equipment. I’m not a farmer, but I did grow up fixing my own cars and such… I can’t imagine any “killer feature” farm equipment has that Deere provides that would require such a closed package. Reliability and serviceability could be those killer features.
- pacetherace 4y agoFarming equipment is quite expensive and typically what is used in a particular region depends on the dealer network. And the dealer network what gives John Deere the power to play these dirty games.
- sleepybrett 4y agoIt's sad. My grandfather before he passed last year owned and drove 64 1/2 mustang. Over it's lifetime he's had to repair it now and again but it's still running great almost 60 years later. How long until Tesla declares some year of cars no longer maintainable? How long until they stop pushing software updates? How long will the deny people the ability to repair their own cars?
- sacnoradhq 4y agoAre you not familiar with Tesla hacker Youtubers who try to repair salvage Teslas only to be told "no"? https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCfV0_wbjG8KJADuZT2ct4SA https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCfV0_wbjG8KJADuZT2ct4SA
- WelcomeShorty 4y agoI thought you made a typo there where you mentioned "still running great almost 60 years later." Turns out you are spot on! "The first-generation Ford Mustang was manufactured by Ford from March 1964 until 1973." So now I am not old, I am Mustang old! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_Mustang_(first_generation) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_Mustang_(first_generation...
- naikrovek 4y agoautomotive right to repair is enshrined in law, but it isn't perpetual. law dictates that parts must be made for any automobile for 10 years after that specific model year stops being manufactured. that's it. law does not say that the parts must be made in sufficient quantity, nor does it limit pricing of the parts, but the parts must be made and be made available to consumers for 10 years. 10 years is all you get, and at the rate of the continued advancement of safety features, I would not want to be driving anything more than 10 years old at any time. That Mustang will gladly pierce your heart and sever your spine with its steering column in a 30Mph head-on collision.
- pabs3 4y agoComments from LWN about it: https://lwn.net/Articles/926330/ https://lwn.net/Articles/926330/
- thread_id 4y agoHere is an economic example of why this issue is so important to farmers. GPL is an important part of this issue. If JD is violating it's GPL license then it shouldn't enjoy the economic benefit of using that software. https://www.thedrive.com/news/31761/enormous-costs-of-new-tractors-drive-demand-of-40-year-old-equipment-to-all-time-highs https://www.thedrive.com/news/31761/enormous-costs-of-new-tr... "A lot more farmers, in fact. Enough to drive up the price of something like an 800-hour 1979 John Deere 4640 to over $60,000 at a Minnesota auction last August, which is more than double the price a well-worn example would fetch, but still a bargain compared to a new $150,000 rig. (Tractors' lives are measured in hours of operation, not miles, with the average hard-working farm tractor logging around 500 hours per year.) Imagine buying a '79 Pontiac Trans Am with 20,000 miles on it, and you get the picture. The difference is, no farmer is paying that much for a low-hour tractor from the Carter Administration without planning on using it day in and day out until it breaks—then fixing it on their own, on the cheap."
- fsckboy 4y agowhat is the Software Freedom Conservancy? the wikipedia page just says anodyne things, but reading between the lines they seem to be a "we like the GPL but we dislike Stallman and GNU and FSF and Moglen"... am I reading into this correctly? as a for-instance, in TFA it says this "issue that goes far beyond one person wanting to fix their printer software" which is a weird strawman-flex and seems more like a childish insult directed at Stallman's creative spark when he invented the software freedom movement in the first place 40ish years ago. Jelly much? Honest question, why would they be divisive like this?
- jsmith45 4y agoSFC does have a strange view of the GPLv2 installation scripts clause. https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2021/jul/23/tivoization-and-the-gpl-right-to-install/ https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2021/jul/23/tivoization-and-t... The normal interpretation is that it includes Configure scripts, Makefiles etc. The SFC claim it also requires things like the encryption keys needed to load the software on that specific device. As most people are aware, GPLv3 added explicit requirement for such keys. The SFC claims that the GPLv2 always required the ability to install modofied software on the device that shipped with GPL (except in cases like ROM, where nobody can modify), and what the GPLv3 is about prohibiting device makers from making their proprietary software stop working when users install modified versions of GPL'd software. I have also heard of at least one other party that asked Stallman flat out if GPLv3 allowed for providing keys that allow for installation of modified versions of the free software software, but where use of such keys bricked the proprietary software that came with the device. Stallman allegedly indicated that it was, which if true counters the SFC narrative.
- pabs3 4y agoConservancy says the GPLv3 doesn't prevent a vendor from breaking their proprietary software when GPLv3 software is updated (which is what TiVo did, for GPLv2 software): https://events19.linuxfoundation.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/Safely-Copylefted-Cars-Reexamining-GPLv3-Installation-Information-Requirements-ALS-Bradley-Kuhn-Behan-Webster-1.pdf https://events19.linuxfoundation.org/wp-content/uploads/2017...
- jsmith45 4y agoUnfortunately those slides directly contradict the blog post I linked, whose thesis is basically that the installation relevant difference between GPLv2 and GPLv3 is only that GPLv3 requires the proprietary software to continue to run (for "User Products"), and GPLv3 specifically requires the keys, but that both still require that end users have the ability to run modified versions of the GPL software on the device, either by giving keys, or by offering the ability to disable secure boot, etc. > [so], these words in GPLv3: “The information must suffice to ensure that the continued functioning of the modified object code is in no case prevented or interfered with solely because modification has been made.” mean that the proprietary software that is not a combined work with the GPLv3'd work must also function? > Stallman replied on 2012-05-06 with: > Absolutely. And I wrote it specifically to do that!
- sacnoradhq 4y agoJohn Deere is the Apple of farm equipment. https://www.hagerty.com/media/news/john-deere-loses-battle-in-right-to-repair-war/ https://www.hagerty.com/media/news/john-deere-loses-battle-i...
- naikrovek 4y agoI don't see anything of substance, here. What software is being produced which is in violation? What GPL software is being used? Where are the claims?