Software Freedom Conservancy files GPL lawsuit against Vizio

Post by pabs3 » Wed, Oct 20, 2021, 1:38 AM UTC

sokoloff wrote: post #43

jepler wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At risk of making a gross oversimplification, sfconservancy seems to be pursuing the angle that GPLv2 _ALSO_ was intended to prevent tivoization. see e.g., https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2021/jul/23/tivoization-and-t... which refers heavily to pre-GPLv3 discussions about the topic. "In GPL enforcement actions at the time, during our “complete, corresponding source (CCS) checks”, we verified that the source code was n…

It’s not at all clear-cut to me. (IANAL.) If a cryptographic key is required, it’s not clear to me that that is either “source code” nor “script used to control compilation/installation”. If you asked developers “is a certificate source code?”, I think most would say “No”. If you asked them “is a certificate a script?”, I think almost all would say “No”. If it’s not either of those things, I don’t know how the licens…

Post by pabs3 » Wed, Oct 20, 2021, 1:41 AM UTC

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Oct 20, 2021, 1:56 AM UTC

perihelions wrote: post #17

JoshTriplett wrote: post #4

An especially novel aspect of this lawsuit, quoting the press release: > This approach makes it the first legal case that focuses on the rights of individual consumers as third-party beneficiaries of the GPL. > “That’s what makes this litigation unique and historic in terms of defending consumer rights,” says Karen M. Sandler, the organization’s executive director. In the past, GPL enforcement has been a cause of act…

> "If this suit is successful, it'll no longer be necessary to prove sufficient standing as a copyright holder of GPLed code in order to enforce the license;" Would such a decision have any usefulness outside of California? This specific lawsuit is filed in a California state court, against a California defendant. /not a lawyer

Post by User23 » Wed, Oct 20, 2021, 2:03 AM UTC

perihelions wrote: post #32

wmf wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also not a lawyer, but can't you sue in California over any product sold in California?

I believe a non-California defendant could move that suit into a federal court ("diversity jurisdiction" isn't it?) But federal courts don't seem to put too much weight on how individual states interpreted a law -- hence my question. (Same /not-a-lawyer as above)

Post by Seirdy » Wed, Oct 20, 2021, 2:23 AM UTC

bluGill wrote: post #53

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #38

While I'm in favor of this, it makes me question somewhat the potential unintended consequences of something like this, in that it makes shipping actual hardware devices with actual software on the device even less appealing. That is, if I provide a SaaS platform, my understanding is that even if I use all types of GPL code to run my service, as long as I don't "ship" the code for that service to end users (which is…

It just drives more companies to be more careful about their license. My company has for years banned any GPL3 code on devices we ship. If GPL2 is suddenly found more restrictive than we expected we will ban that too. FreeBSD/NetBSD will be the winner there, along with other projects. We don't contribute much, but we already consider license before we contribute back - and if we can't get GPL code we will make the ch…