Hyman Rosen wrote: [...] > The only important part of the track record is that after each case, > the GPLed sources are available.
You seem to not grasp the situation, Hyman: the SFLC has sued (filing utterly defective copyright complaints warranting automatic dismissal) a bunch of companies distributing hardware boxes allegedly containing the GPL'd software without referring to the GPL and/or source code while distributing (note: consider 17 USC 109 -- see the first ever answer to the GPL complaint in court by Bell Microproducts, Inc. (Marvin, Lynn) http://www.terekhov.de/14.pdf ) said boxes. (The boxes are all made where the firmware is installed -- in China/Taiwan.) The said companies also offer the firmware (allegedly containing the GPL'd software) from their respective web sites. In the complaints, the SFLC was talking about "reinstantiation" of the (copyright) rights that (allegedly) had been "automatically" terminated by virtue of the GPL. According to the SFLC's former press releases, some of those companies have joined the SFLC in issuing a press release announcing a "settlement" with commitments going beyond the GPL (e.g. "Monsoon Multimedia has agreed to appoint an Open Source Compliance Officer within its organization to monitor and ensure GPL compliance, to publish the source code for the version of BusyBox it previously distributed on its Web site, and to undertake substantial efforts to notify previous recipients of BusyBox from Monsoon Multimedia of their rights to the software under the GPL. The settlement also includes an undisclosed amount of financial consideration paid by Monsoon Multimedia to the plaintiffs" http://www.softwarefreedom.org/news/2007/oct/30/busybox-monsoon-settlement/ ). Note that Verizon managed to dismiss the case *with prejudice* against plaintiffs and without any press release telling anything about Verizon's commitments. All GPL cases were voluntarily terminated by the SFLC without any judicial saying (the default judgment against BELL MICROPRODUCTS, INC. D.B.A. HAMMER STORAGE was put aside by the court). The last four cases (out of seven) were voluntarily terminated by the SFLC without any joint press release. The first case of such kind was against Verizon. What say you now, Hyman? regards, alexander. -- http://gng.z505.com/index.htm (GNG is a derecursive recursive derecursion which pwns GNU since it can be infinitely looped as GNGNGNGNG...NGNGNG... and can be said backwards too, whereas GNU cannot.) _______________________________________________ gnu-misc-discuss mailing list [email protected] http://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/gnu-misc-discuss
