On the one hand Sony is pushing for SOPA, but on the other hand Sony is violating the GPL. They could end up actively pushing through legislation that ends up significantly harming their bottom line.
The ongoing fight against GPL enforcement
31–40 of 94 posts
Re: The ongoing fight against GPL enforcement
#32Earlier quoted context omitted.
Isn't S90 a compact camera? It's much worse quality than the NEX series. If you care about that, try Olympus E-P1 or some other mirrorless camera.
Yes I know the S90 is a compact camera. Rather than go one down in the category, I decided to go one category down and buy the top camera in that category. fwiw here is a picture from the S90 and one from the Olympus E-P1 http://a.img-dpreview.com/reviews/canons90/samples/comparedt... http://a.img-dpreview.com/reviews/OlympusEP1/samples/compare...
Re: The ongoing fight against GPL enforcement
#33Is my analogy correct at all? Essentially Sony wants to be able to pirate (that's what it's called when you're redistributing things that are copywritten), so they're removing the only project that actually litigates against them?
Re: The ongoing fight against GPL enforcement
#34Earlier quoted context omitted.
On one hand, if the license holders of the other infringing software don't care to enforce the license, why should anybody care? It makes no sense to me, but it's up to them. Believe it or not, most free software developers aren't dying to spend their time and money to start a copyright lawsuit against Sony. That doesn't mean they're actually OK with their copyright and licenses being violated. Public shaming is ofte…
If there are GPL software developers who are having their licenses infringed and want to enforce, they can grant SFC the authority to enforce. I really don't see the problem here. On the other hand, more software that is not infected with a proprietary or copyleft license is always good.
Re: The ongoing fight against GPL enforcement
#35Maybe I misunderstood, but I'm not seeing how this is bad. Sony wants to write a BusyBox that doesn't use BusyBox's license? What exactly is the problem? If they don't like the license isn't that the best approach they can take? "A couple of weeks ago, this page appeared on the elinux.org wiki. It's written by an engineer at Sony, and it's calling for contributions to rewriting Busybox. This would be entirely reasona…
Re: The ongoing fight against GPL enforcement
#36Maybe I misunderstood, but I'm not seeing how this is bad. Sony wants to write a BusyBox that doesn't use BusyBox's license? What exactly is the problem? If they don't like the license isn't that the best approach they can take? "A couple of weeks ago, this page appeared on the elinux.org wiki. It's written by an engineer at Sony, and it's calling for contributions to rewriting Busybox. This would be entirely reasona…
> I'm also not sure I like the idea of using BusyBox as a backdoor to examine the rest of a product's source code. I didn't realize that was a condition of the GPL, but it makes me glad I've switched most of my projects over to the BSD and ISC licenses. This is based on one interpretation of the GPL: That if you violate the license, you lose the license to that software forever, including new versions of it, until yo…
Re: The ongoing fight against GPL enforcement
#37Maybe I misunderstood, but I'm not seeing how this is bad. Sony wants to write a BusyBox that doesn't use BusyBox's license? What exactly is the problem? If they don't like the license isn't that the best approach they can take? "A couple of weeks ago, this page appeared on the elinux.org wiki. It's written by an engineer at Sony, and it's calling for contributions to rewriting Busybox. This would be entirely reasona…
> I'm also not sure I like the idea of using BusyBox as a backdoor to examine the rest of a product's source code. I didn't realize that was a condition of the GPL, but it makes me glad I've switched most of my projects over to the BSD and ISC licenses. This is based on one interpretation of the GPL: That if you violate the license, you lose the license to that software forever, including new versions of it, until yo…
They are connected in the way that the same people whose license you violated are the ones granting you the new license. And I'd say they have reasonable doubt as to whether you will comply with the new license, since you didn't before. They don't have to grant you a license to use it, you know. Using someone else's IP is a privilege, not a right.
Re: The ongoing fight against GPL enforcement
#38Maybe I misunderstood, but I'm not seeing how this is bad. Sony wants to write a BusyBox that doesn't use BusyBox's license? What exactly is the problem? If they don't like the license isn't that the best approach they can take? "A couple of weeks ago, this page appeared on the elinux.org wiki. It's written by an engineer at Sony, and it's calling for contributions to rewriting Busybox. This would be entirely reasona…
This is bad because Busybox has copyright holders that actively enforce the GPL on their product. They're not asking for this because they dislike Busybox'es GPL license. They're asking for it because they know Busybox actually goes to court to enforce it, and asks for the other GPL products to have their license respected too. I'll spell it out more clearer: they want to get rid of Busybox, because its one of the on…
Why is this a bad thing, other than that it weakens the importance of the GPL?
Re: The ongoing fight against GPL enforcement
#39Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is bad because Busybox has copyright holders that actively enforce the GPL on their product. They're not asking for this because they dislike Busybox'es GPL license. They're asking for it because they know Busybox actually goes to court to enforce it, and asks for the other GPL products to have their license respected too. I'll spell it out more clearer: they want to get rid of Busybox, because its one of the on…
I'm still not seeing the problem. On one hand, if the license holders of the other infringing software don't care to enforce the license, why should anybody care? It makes no sense to me, but it's up to them. On the other hand, if Sony would rather write it themselves than abide by the GPL then I'm not seeing the problem there, either. Again, it makes no sense, but it's their decision.
Nobody has a problem with Sony writing their own version of BusyBox - good for them if they can do it. But, if the reason they are writing their own version, is so they can, without worry, violate _everyone else's_ copyright - then that's somewhat shady behavior.
Ironically - from a "Game Theoretic" position, Sony's approach is entirely rational. Take out the opponent who can stand up against you, and crush those who can't.
So - I'm simultaneously impressed by their strategy while offended by their attitude.
Re: The ongoing fight against GPL enforcement
#40Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is bad because Busybox has copyright holders that actively enforce the GPL on their product. They're not asking for this because they dislike Busybox'es GPL license. They're asking for it because they know Busybox actually goes to court to enforce it, and asks for the other GPL products to have their license respected too. I'll spell it out more clearer: they want to get rid of Busybox, because its one of the on…
So, if they switch to (say) a full BSD-licensed stack, what is the problem? They can use it for whatever, modify the code for whatever, and there shouldn't be any problems. Why is this a bad thing, other than that it weakens the importance of the GPL?
They want to switch to a mostly-GPL stack, except for the one component that causes them to have to live up to their GPL obligations.