On Wednesday, August 19, 2015 7:14:19 PM Michael Orlitzky wrote: > On 08/19/2015 06:21 PM, Rich Freeman wrote: > >> > >> Copyright law makes everything illegal. Downloading the source and > >> reading it is illegal. Why wouldn't it be illegal? The copyright holders > >> have made it clear that you have no license to do so. > >> > > > > If I distribute a binary kernel module, I'm not copying anything that > > I didn't write. I'm the copyright holder of the binary kernel module. > > > > Anything you can do without the kernel source code is legal, sure. But > we're talking about... > > 1. Downloading the kernel source (making a copy of) it. > 2. Patching it. > 3. Linking it with closed source code. > 4. Distributing the result. > > (If that's not what you have in mind, maybe we are at cross purposes). > > Step #1 is illegal unless you have a licence. The burden of proof is on > you to show that you were allowed to do it.
You have the license, the GPL allows you to do steps 1-3. Step 4 is only illegal if it's a derived work, so the question, as Rich stated, is whether or nor is a derived work. The law is not clear about that. But how can it not be a derived work if it doesn't work without it? > > > > That is why I want you to actually look up the letter of the law, > > because if the specific action being done isn't in the letter of the > > law, then those claiming copyright have an uphill battle ahead of > > them. > > > > I'm not going to go look up whatever statute says "you can't make a copy > of copyrighted stuff" =P > > -- Fernando Rodriguez
