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A federal court has denied a pre-trial motion to dismiss a GPL enforcement case

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Re: A federal court has denied a pre-trial motion to dismiss a GPL enforcement case

#51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think there is legally such a distinction.

In contract law it is essential that both sides get something of value out of the deal. If not, it's not a contract. This is called "consideration" and it's why e.g. you'll see on the news people pay a symbolic $1 for a failing business or a tumbledown building rather than nothing at all. For example you can't make a contract in which I just pay you $50 per year. But you can have a contract in which I pay you $50 per…

I don't know about that. You're getting the right to use the software, which otherwise you don't have.

Re: A federal court has denied a pre-trial motion to dismiss a GPL enforcement case

#53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think you're wrong, I just think you're splitting hairs. The order says the license is a contract that exists, sure. Contracts are enforceable.

No. The order says that iff what the plaintiff says is true , a contract probably exists :)

I hope you don't really mean 'iff' there.

Re: A federal court has denied a pre-trial motion to dismiss a GPL enforcement case

#54

One thing I often wonder is how a company providing such open source software can find out (and proof) if someone is using it in a closed-source project. All I can think of is "guessing" based on behavior of the downstream tool. Also, the article doesn't say much about how that lawsuit came to be. Did Artifex approach Hancom beforehand to notify them about the license infringement or just directly sue? I guess in thi…

>I can imagine some (smaller) companies not being fully aware of open source license specifics and unknowingly running into a lawsuit This is not a real problem until there are licensing trolls, where their sole purpose is to make money off of breaches. If a company receives a lawsuit, they can claim ignorance and start to comply with the contract. This would change it into a minor breach of contract, where they woul…

> If a company receives a lawsuit, they can claim ignorance and start to comply with the contract.

Are you sure claiming ignorance would make a difference? I tried to google it and found the Wikipedia article on "Ignorantia juris non excusat"[1], which claims that in most countries, not knowing a certain law provides no protection whatsoever.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignorantia_juris_non_excusat

Re: A federal court has denied a pre-trial motion to dismiss a GPL enforcement case

#55
post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no such thing as an EULA attempting to limit your terms. Without a licence, you have no right at all.

> Without a licence, you have no right at all. On what grounds do you have no right to use a copy of software you bought without obtaining an additional license from the vendor? As for copying it's copyright, obviously, but I never understood what's the matter with merely using. IANAL but AFAIK in some EU countries it is recognized that there is no legal basis for EULAs and they officially are void, unless signed as…

> unless signed as a contract prior to the purchase, of course.

Not quite. There is no need to sign anything, what matters is if the EULA was included in the sale contract (so, the buyer was aware that the willingness of the seller to sell you the product depended on the buyer accepting those additional terms as part of the contract). On the other hand, if you do indeed sign an additional contract afterwards on your free will that limits your rights, that might very well be enforcable. But the point is that there is no legal necessity to sign such a contract in order to use the software that you have bought.

Re: A federal court has denied a pre-trial motion to dismiss a GPL enforcement case

#56
post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Premise: You have legally obtained a copy of some software. Status quo: You can use the software. You're not allowed to redistribute copies or modified versions of the software. EULA: You may only use the software if you agree to additional terms. Usage rights are restricted. GPL: You may redistribute copies as well as modified versions as long as distribution happens under the terms of the GPL. Distribution rights a…

What about the disclaimer of warranty and limitation of liability?

That's a question that has to be answered by lawyers and judges. Personally, I doubt that blanket disclaimers really do much of anything in my jurisdiction.

Re: A federal court has denied a pre-trial motion to dismiss a GPL enforcement case

#58
post #48
post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What are you talking about? There is no such distinction. The GPL derives its enforcability from the same principle EULA's do.

Umm, so when you buy a copy of a proprietary software, why don't you have to sign and/or agree to the EULA? Also, does the seller have to reimburse you if you decline the license (and of course return the copy)? So you pay for the copy but not for the license, and you got the license free if you paid for the copy, right? (But of course that license comes with a lot of restrictions, just like the GPL.) But the importa…

You usually have to agree to some EULA. It's part of the contract. Second q depends on whether you could have known what's in the EULA before you bought it. They're not separate things. There is no such thing as 'buying' and 'agreeing to a licence' or anything like that. A 'licence' is just a contract: party A pays $X to party B, in exchange for which party B lets party A copy its IP, under a given set of conditions. 'pay for the copy but not for the licence' is a grammatically correct sentence but meaningless, like when I'd say 'I punch this wall red with my horse'. Copyright is about 'copying', so if that's what you mean by 'distributors', then yes. But so do 'EULA's' and all other IP-related contracts (usually called 'licences').

As to your last question: yes there is, people have written dozens of book about it. Your local university probably has a bunch of them in their library. If you're asking about a website where you can read in a few paragraphs the complete legal context with definitive answers to questions about general cases (i.e., no 'it depends' allowed) - then no, such a thing does not exist. Look at it this way: if a novice programmer goes onto LKML and says 'hey guys, I want to write an OS, can someone point me to an overview' - then at best he'd be pointed to some high-level overview Wikipedia pages, but most likely, people would snicker and press 'delete' (well actually he'd probably receive a bunch of abuse on how he should get off the list, but that's specific to the example I chose...)

FWIW, I did read a bunch of book like the ones I mentioned above when I was writing a paper on a EULA-related topic during my law degree, and as a result I don't make any blanket statements about the topic any more.

Re: A federal court has denied a pre-trial motion to dismiss a GPL enforcement case

#59
post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is an enormous legal difference between shinkwrap licenses that limit your terms, and a license that grants you additional permissions . Your typical "EULA" is the former type. Copyleft licenses like the GNU GPL are the latter type. A typical "EULA" attempts to reduce your rights, without any further consideration from you (you'll have already paid for it, etc). If you disagree, the authors like to claim that y…

There is no such thing as an EULA attempting to limit your terms. Without a licence, you have no right at all.

That's not true. When was the last time you saw a EULA on a book or a CD? Software is not fundamentally different. I give you money, you give me a copy of the product, and then copyright law lets me use that copy within certain bounds.

Re: A federal court has denied a pre-trial motion to dismiss a GPL enforcement case

#60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In contract law it is essential that both sides get something of value out of the deal. If not, it's not a contract. This is called "consideration" and it's why e.g. you'll see on the news people pay a symbolic $1 for a failing business or a tumbledown building rather than nothing at all. For example you can't make a contract in which I just pay you $50 per year. But you can have a contract in which I pay you $50 per…

I don't know about that. You're getting the right to use the software, which otherwise you don't have.

> ...which otherwise you don't have.

Why not? If I own a chair, I have the right to use it. If I own a copy of the software (that I paid for in a store, for example), then there is nothing in law that says that I cannot use it. I have rights over what I own. Nothing restricts that.

Copyright law exists to protect software writers by providing them with a means to make money making software. This law restricts my ability to make copies. There is no law that restricts my ability to use what I own.

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