David Schwartz, how do you possible read:

"[T]he owner of a particular copy or phonorecord lawfully made under this title, or any person authorized by such owner, is entitled, without the authority of the copyright owner, to sell or otherwise dispose of the possession of that copy or phonorecord."

to mean anyone *except*, or *excluding*, the owner or persons authorized by the owner is guilty of copyright infringement? Meaning, if you don't have authorization, then it's copyright infringement. That means you.

Please, do check it out and let us know how that works out for you. Try it with music, with code, whatever :)

I understand it that it applies to *unmodified* copies. So they can download the source or a binary (if distributed by the authors) and pass it on. But in order to modify it, they need to comply with the license. Also, I'm not sure embedding it in your product counts as selling. They might have to sell it separately or in bundle for the user to use as they want, including making the company's product work.
Wonder if compiling the code to get another version of the binary for their hardware counts as modification.
This way the authors still get the contributions.

I don't know if people are just dumb, but if charged with a GPL violation, just claim your conduct was authorized by 17 USC 109"

"[T]he owner of a particular copy or phonorecord lawfully made under this title, or any person authorized by such owner, is entitled, without the authority of the copyright owner, to sell or otherwise dispose of the possession of that copy or phonorecord."

Every copy was lawfully made -- the GPL authorized everything up to the distribution. And distribution of a lawfully-created work cannot be a copyright violation, because 17 USC 109 authorizes it.

Is it just me or is there a big descrepancy between the damages awarded to the Music companies and this ?

If you distribute a music CD on the internet, for people to download for free, you can expect to be ordered to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars.

If you are a big corporation and you steal GPL software in order to make money for your shareholders, you only have to pay 90.000$.

Looks like crime pays better for corporations.

So do I have this about right?
Win a courtcase for a commercial license: 900,000
Win a courtcase for GPL: 90,000.

But either way it's something at least.
But still, if the lawyers alone already cost close to 50K then the 90K doesn't seem too much for a win in the US.

So they used busybox.. Big deal, go ahead and let ppl have busybox code, including any mods you may have done. You do not have to release your proprietary application that runs the product. I presume there is a custom application there, right? Now everybody is happy - GPL is complied with and company IP is protected. Just be careful how you partition and link your software.

@atlas and others,

What makes the GPL so different than any other license? Do not others that license their products enforce them? The GPL is about letting others use the software code for free. Other licenses are about using others code and software for a cost, which they most likely pay every year.

Why would anyone think differently about the GPL? Do not other licenses become enforced through the courts? Do they do this on a whim or by virtue of a violation of the license terms?

Would it not be considered the epitome of stupidity to make these claims about licenses in general? So, your fanboyish support of Microsoft doesn't extend to supporting their licenses? So, you feel as a fanboi of Microsoft that you can violate their terms and not worry about it? Do you not believe that Microsoft should enforce their license terms?

The GPL is about allowing anyone to use the code, to enhance it, and to make product off it. But if they release the product based off that code, in any form, they have to give back to the original author the code changes. That way everyone benefits.

IF THEY DON'T WANT TO DO THIS THEN THEY DON'T USE THE CODE.

So, why on earth would anyone think the GPL is bad or that it should be made illegal? Thoughts like that are the height of stupidity.

So the guys that developed BusyBox don't deserve to be paid? The companies that are the subject of this suit didn't want to pay their own developers, and rather ripped of someone else's work to save money.

There are two choices for these companies: use the GPL licensed software, comply with the license terms and release the required source code or approach the BusyBox authors and request a license to use the code without the GPL - as copy right holders they can do this, although I'd bet they may ask for some money. The third option is to write the code you need yourself. The latter two result in developers getting paid, which seems to be important to you, and the first results in people getting something for free (although it may be useless to them) in exchange for the stuff they gave away for free which for most open source projects seems to be payment enough.

These guys chose, whether through ignorance or disregard, to use a GPL'd product and now all these trolls appear to write a sob story about how some big company is hard done by when they got busted screwing someone over. I tell you what, why not go write some software and get paid rather than uninformed and stupid comments about subjects you clearly don't have the mental facilities to comprehend? Or is that why you aren't being paid?

Coming out of the woodworks, blathering the usual FUD concerning the thing their limited intelligence cannot comprehend : GPL.
Keep parroting the company line, boys ! It provides entertainment for the rest of us.

Would somebody build me hause out of courtesy? If so I would gladly develop software for free.

Just because a doorman is paid to open a door, doesn't mean I can't open a door for someone out of courtesy. And just because some people are paid for writing software doesn't mean people should only be allowed to write software if they are paid.

Software developers should be paid for theier job. Or maybe we should all switch to comunism. Let there be GPL homes, GPL cars, GPL restaurants, GPL hotels...

Well, you're wrong. Just... wrong.

There's nothing preventing you or anyone else from making money by writing GPL'd software, and the FSF is explicit about this. Not only is this allowed, it's encouraged. But you have to offer value beyond just obfuscation.

Look at Red Hat, it's billion dollar a year revenue company based entirely upon GPL licenced software, and it contributes massively to the Linux kernel and many other FOSS projects.

Novell also seems to be doing alright with SuSE Linux, and it contributes to the community, too. Arguably losses it incurs from its closed-source software products are what are holding it back.

You can dual-license GPL'd software, just look at the history of MySQL if you doubt that can work.

You can offer actual services to your customers, over and above just closed-source binaries and version churn and serial extortion, the Microsoft model.

But go ahead and publish your software under a BSD licence. But don't come crying when someone steals it, adds a bit of code and makes big money with it, because you will have asked for it.

Altas! you poor little paid parrot, move out, move off the way, you only clutter.
And in your spare time (I wonder if you may have any) go out and read the GPL and about people and companies that make lots of many on/via open source... oh! I know you probably are like this Ukrainian scientist who sued Toyota... aren't you him?

It is a recipe for disaster to have a business interest use a GPL item--especially if any modifications are done on it. Lawrence Lessig will own your butt if you EVER attempt to make money using GPL software in your stuff.

The only licenses any business should use in development of any sort are FreeBDS/Mozilla variants, or simply stay with proprietary.

You see, socialism requires that you give your work to the world for free. Mr. Lessig will use force of law to make you his little pet, you corporate entity with that stupid developer who used FOSS!

Oh, and be sure to fire that developer who screwed your company over. You'll be doing him/her a favor, because then he can be on the public dole, perfecting his own socialist tendency.

Long live Stalin! (Weren't those Purges grand?) After all, it's all about power, however you get need to get it.

I makes me wonder just why some of the companies pay big bucks for corporate lawyers. It also causes me to wonder it this is the general theme companies use when it comes to software licenses... as in ignore the terms.

Complying with the GPL is so brain-dead simple. Did anyone actually read it.?

A good day for the open source community.

The amazing thing is that in order to comply with the GPL, you need only to make the source code available. From the Groklaw link is cited that *Sony* does this, so it's surely not onerous.