On Jun 9, 2008, Alan Cox <alan@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > On Mon, Jun 09, 2008 at 08:29:28AM +0100, David Woodhouse wrote: >> I agree with you that that seems to be the only possible interpretation >> for firmware blobs. And when we take them and include them in the >> bzImage and distribute that, the only possible interpretation is that >> they are 'part of a whole which is a work based on the Program'. > Disagree. Please elaborate. Do you disagree he agrees with you? :-) Do you see other interpretations? Do you disagree we take them and include them in the bzImage and distribute that (or any of these individually)? Do you disagree it's part of a whole? Do you disagree this whole it is part of is a work based on the Program? >> But it's extremely hard to argue that combining non-GPL'd firmware into >> the kernel image is 'mere aggregation on a volume of a storage or >> distribution medium'. > Disagree. Three bytes: tg3 Same source file, even. Mere aggregation? Where can I get the separate works, then? > learn about the actual legal caselaw in the case things like books, Since you appear to have done your homework, could you please help me find any case in which a book was published containing an article whose authors wrote something like 'I will only permit the publication of this article if all the articles in the book, and the whole of the book, are under a copyleft license', the book was published with of non-copyleft material, and the author of the article sued for copyright infringement? > and also on the boundaries of contract created by copyright. ?!?!? Copyright does not create contracts. Copyright creates restrictions that a copyright holder may selectively enforce on third parties. Licenses relieve third parties from such restrictions. Contracts often include provisions for licensing, but a mere grant of permissions is not a contract because there's no reciprocation, no mutual obligations. The GPL, for example, is a mere grant of permissions. It does not require or prohibit anything, it just grants bounded permissions. Whatever is forbidden even in the presence of the GPL is forbidden because the law forbids such actions without a license that permits them, not because the GPL prohibits them. Example: a law is passed that prohibits people from walking on their feet. The king grants permission for you to walk on a single foot. You still can't walk on both feet, but that's not because the grant of permissions forbids you from walking normally, it's because the law does. The permission you got just doesn't go as far as granting you permission to walk that way. On Jun 9, 2008, Alan Cox <alan@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > On Mon, Jun 09, 2008 at 08:40:33AM +0100, David Woodhouse wrote: >> Are you suggesting that the bzImage we ship is not derived from the >> kernel source? Or that to distribute it, you don't need the permission >> which is granted by the GPL? > Nothing of the sort. I'm suggesting conventional interpretations of copyright > law might apply. The ones the lawyers seem to consider conventional IIRC it says that modifying, distributing (including publishing) a work requires permission from the copyright holder, and, in the absence of such a permission, such acts are forbidden by law. Do you even have a case here? -- Alexandre Oliva http://www.lsd.ic.unicamp.br/~oliva/ Free Software Evangelist oliva@{lsd.ic.unicamp.br, gnu.org} FSFLA Board Member ¡Sé Libre! => http://www.fsfla.org/ Red Hat Compiler Engineer aoliva@{redhat.com, gcc.gnu.org} -- fedora-devel-list mailing list fedora-devel-list@xxxxxxxxxx https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-devel-list
