On 12/20/06, Timothy Miller <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
I'm sure most of you saw the slashdot story about Greg K-H proposing a kernel patch that would eliminate non-GPL drivers, followed by a discussion about how that would impact developers, followed by an apology. Well, apparently, the discussion is continuing, I'm told, and there has even been mention of the OHF (pointing to the Open Graphics wiki). If there's someone on this list who is also on LKML, it might be useful for us to keep tabs on this as well as participate a bit in the discussion.
Indeed. I'm subscribed to LKML and just finished the thread... mostly pseudo-legal bickering about Fair Use (as laid out by U.S. copyright law) and the DMCA (again, U.S. law - though spreading elsewhere). I haven't seen glaring mistakes yet uncorrected, or any obvious chances to plug the project more so than has already been done. As a summary, Linus's (and Ted's) position is a fair one: Fair Use allows use of works without the permission of the author(s) for purposes the author(s) may not agree with. Applying a technical measure to prevent such uses triggers the DMCA - bad. Also, in order for the GPL to prohibit the distribution of binary-only kernel modules, they must be derived works... the definition of which, the fog of Fair Use tend to make fuzzy. In other words, in order to prevent the distribution of binary-only kernel modules, we need a court case. Possibly several. The situation is necessarily not ideal... such is life. Market forces (us!), however, tend to correct such things over time. --tim _______________________________________________ Open-graphics mailing list [email protected] http://lists.duskglow.com/mailman/listinfo/open-graphics List service provided by Duskglow Consulting, LLC (www.duskglow.com)
