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An Open Letter to Intel

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Re: An Open Letter to Intel

#291

Post by xyzzyz »

varjag wrote: post #284
teilo wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The strict meaning of "Redistributions" in that clause means that Intel would have to be distributing the OS itself as a product in binary form. Deploying it in an embedded system, and selling that embedded system, particularly in a form where the user does not have access to the OS as a product, does not meet that definition. Tanenbaum himself concedes this point in this letter.

This is quite debatable, not something I'd bet a court case on. One of my libraries with BSD 3-clause license was used in a U.S. government project. It did require particular hardware and couldn't really be deployed by any random user but they honored the mention clause without any prodding on my part. My Bosch kitchen appliances came with a whole bunch of software licenses for embedded subsystems, even GPL ones. So…

GPL3 was practically created to cover this case, as FSF lawyers didn’t feel that GPL2 is enough to enforce that. Check out the TiVoization clause in GPL3 and its history.

Re: An Open Letter to Intel

#292

Post by ForHackernews »

kodablah wrote: post #192
josteink wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would also force Intel to give us a means to replace ME with something else which ultimately puts the user in control.

Nope, because they wouldn't use it then. I am not sure why people think the GPL had so much leverage over larger companies that will just build something in house.

Good. At least it will cost them to develop in-house. Raising the expense of doing user-hostile things is one way to dissuade companies from doing them.

Re: An Open Letter to Intel

#293

Post by yrro »

teilo wrote: post #268
rahiel wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Minix 3 license contains [0]: * Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution. So it looks like Minix's license does require the copyright/license to be included in distributions. [0]: https://github.com/Stichting-MINIX-Research-Foundation/minix...

The strict meaning of "Redistributions" in that clause means that Intel would have to be distributing the OS itself as a product in binary form. Deploying it in an embedded system, and selling that embedded system, particularly in a form where the user does not have access to the OS as a product, does not meet that definition. Tanenbaum himself concedes this point in this letter.

Is there case law to back this up?

Re: An Open Letter to Intel

#294

Post by dchest »

xyzzyz wrote: post #291
varjag wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is quite debatable, not something I'd bet a court case on. One of my libraries with BSD 3-clause license was used in a U.S. government project. It did require particular hardware and couldn't really be deployed by any random user but they honored the mention clause without any prodding on my part. My Bosch kitchen appliances came with a whole bunch of software licenses for embedded subsystems, even GPL ones. So…

GPL3 was practically created to cover this case, as FSF lawyers didn’t feel that GPL2 is enough to enforce that. Check out the TiVoization clause in GPL3 and its history.

No it didn't. GPLv3 was created to cover the case of hardware vendors not allowing to run modified code. They still have to abide by the terms of the license even if they use GPLv2 -- that is, releasing the source code.

Re: An Open Letter to Intel

#295

Post by snksnk »

jhasse wrote: post #103
gtrubetskoy wrote: post #80

All Dr. Tanenbaum is saying is that it would have been the classy thing to let him know, nothing more. Professor Tanenbaum is one of the most respected computer scientists alive, and for Intel to include Minix in their chip and not let him know is kind of unprofessional and not very nice to say the least. That is his only (and quite fair) point.

> and for Intel to include Minix in their chip and not let him know is kind of unprofessional and not very nice to say the least. I guess Minix' license, which allows this kind of behaviour, is the very reason Intel chose Minix in the first place. I imagine it would be very complicated to get management approval for informing Dr. Tannenbaum about the usage in Intel's ME. IMHO if he has a problem with the way things w…

But as clearly indicated in the text, dr. Tannenbaum does not have a problem with how things worked out:

> I don't mind, of course, and was not expecting any kind of payment since that is not required. There isn't even any suggestion in the license that it would be appreciated.

> The only thing that would have been nice is that after the project had been finished and the chip deployed, that someone from Intel would have told me, just as a courtesy, that MINIX 3 was now probably the most widely used operating system in the world on x86 computers. That certainly wasn't required in any way, but I think it would have been polite to give me a heads up, that's all.

> If nothing else, this bit of news reaffirms my view that the Berkeley license provides the maximum amount of freedom to potential users. If they want to publicize what they have done, fine. By all means, do so. If there are good reasons not to release the modfied code, that's fine with me, too.

Re: An Open Letter to Intel

#296

Post by ksk »

josteink wrote: post #135
boobsbr wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are not the user in case, Intel is.

Intel is not the user. They are a vendor, a publisher. By calling them "users" and saying "users have freedom" you are conflating things needlessly. We are the users here. We severely lack freedom. (Thanks BSD!)

Using copyright laws to force a person to release the fruits of their labor is not a definition of freedom that is widely agreed upon.

Re: An Open Letter to Intel

#297

Post by ac29 »

teilo wrote: post #268
rahiel wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Minix 3 license contains [0]: * Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution. So it looks like Minix's license does require the copyright/license to be included in distributions. [0]: https://github.com/Stichting-MINIX-Research-Foundation/minix...

The strict meaning of "Redistributions" in that clause means that Intel would have to be distributing the OS itself as a product in binary form. Deploying it in an embedded system, and selling that embedded system, particularly in a form where the user does not have access to the OS as a product, does not meet that definition. Tanenbaum himself concedes this point in this letter.

Aren't BIOS updates (which contain the ME code) considered binary distributions? me_cleaner woudn't work otherwise.

I suppose you could make the argument that the OEMs are the ones distributing the binaries, but they are out there.

Re: An Open Letter to Intel

#298

Post by ksk »

davexunit wrote: post #231
Fredej wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is probably gonna be a controversial view but my experience is this as well: Deploying GPL code is a legal process. Deploying BSD is a development process. We spent thousands of dollars on legal advice when deploying GPL. In the end it was largely as we expected it to be: No significant action was needed beyond releasing the code to the components that we already got for free, with the minor modifications we had…

I'm so tired of hearing this. The GPL is only a legal problem if you are trying to skirt the rules and distribute proprietary software but use GPL components. I've never needed to legal advice to deal with GPL code.

> The GPL is only a legal problem if you are trying to skirt the rules and distribute proprietary software but use GPL components.

Well, a random developer can't simply assert it - you need lawyers to make sure you really are conforming to the GPL. With BSD, you don't. This is simply the ground reality.

Re: An Open Letter to Intel

#299

Post by kbutler »

stinkytaco wrote: post #281
kodablah wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nope, because they wouldn't use it then. I am not sure why people think the GPL had so much leverage over larger companies that will just build something in house.

But large companies use quite a bit of GPL software. I'm checked my phone, my PVR, my car media system and proprietary GPS I have and all of them have an open source license document that includes some GPL code. For a hardware company, the GPL just isn't that much of a competitive disadvantage, since most of the software is written to work with their hardware.

Please convince Nvidia of that. Their closed source drivers are a major hindrance in the Linux community. They keep them closed because they feel the driver source would reveal additional details about their hardware, giving up some of their advantage over competitors.

Re: An Open Letter to Intel

#300

Post by ksk »

Radim wrote: post #6
tarruda wrote: post #4

> when companies have told me that they hate the GPL because they are not keen on spending a lot of time, energy, and money modifying some piece of code, only to be required to give it to their competitors for free Some piece of code that also cost time (and possibly someone's else money) to develop, and that they got for free?

This struck me as bizarre as well. You're thanking someone because you relicensed your hard work so they can use it for free (BSD) and you complied? All for the stated reason that they don't have to relicense their work to other people so they could use it for free? /facepalm It's like some version of the Stockholm syndrome, deserves a name.

>You're thanking someone because you relicensed your hard work so they can use it for free (BSD) and you complied?

That sounds like an argument against open sharing of source code and ideas.

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