On Wed, Apr 16, 2014 at 5:35 PM, Bradley M. Kuhn <[email protected]> wrote: > > That said, there is definitely a chilling effect: developers are afraid of > losing their jobs or facing trouble at work if they even state their opinions > in support of GPL enforcement, let alone doing enforcement.
I'm sure there are situations in which a developer's non-work activities enforcing the GPL could interfere with their work obligations (e.g. if the developer works at a law firm engaged in defending against the same kind of Linux/GPL cases that they bring in their spare time as a former kernel dev), but in the general case, I hope that employers would not be able to quash an employee's personal, non-work-time hobby of GPL enforcement. Is there anything specific that could be done to reduce the possibility of reprisal from an employer? I assume that in the process of bringing suit against a company, the names of all copyright holders would be made public, so masking identity to avoid harassment wouldn't work. > I think most people on this list would be surprised to learn and will > probably doubt me when I say there is a not-really-coordinated, but nearly > universal, effort by many "Linux"-related companies, working very hard to > squelch anyone who attempts to enforce the GPL, and doubly so against anyone > who coordinates many people together to enforce GPL (like I do). I can certainly imagine that many such "Linux"-related companies would be annoyed with the work you do regarding GPL enforcement, as they'd much rather pretend that the kernel Linux and other pieces of software may be used willy-nilly. They see you and your colleagues as an impediment to their desire to ship a proprietary product, and the GPL as a mechanism that might allow others to reuse their work. But though some may wish to peel the GPL badge off the kernel and replace it with an "Apache" or "BSD" one, I am a bit surprised to hear that companies are working so hard to squelch your work. I'd expect them to be frustrated, perhaps, but not to redouble their efforts when you/your non-profit steps up to coordinate enforcement of copyleft. Do the companies not understand the GPL, or are they willfully violating it because they don't think anyone will bother to enforce it? To what extent would further education at the developer/engineer level help? Cheers, --R
