Re: [Ksummit-discuss] [CORE TOPIC] GPL defense issues

[Linus Torvalds <torvalds@linux-foundation.org>]

On Sun, Aug 28, 2016 at 12:36 PM, Theodore Ts'o <tytso@mit.edu> wrote:
>
> I didn't say that.  I said consensus driven and taking into account
> all of the stakeholders.  If it makes you feel better, how about
> "Linus as the benevolent dictator"?  He makes a point of gathering
> input from multiple stakeholders, and delegating authority to others
> for day to day decisions.  That's how we do our development, after
> all.

So quite honestly, I think everybody would be much happier if we were
not even ever in the situation where that would be required.

Personally, I really think that legal action by the "community" is not
at all what we should hope for, or even _aim_ for. As mentioned, I
don't think it has worked wonderfully well.

But we do have examples of Linux GPL-related legal action that I think
we *all* can agree has worked absolutely stunningly well.

I don't think anybody disagrees that IBM's legal actions against SCO
were a really good thing. No, that was not mainly about some "GPL test
case" or "license clarification", and it wasn't even _mainly_ about
the GPL.

But the GPL _was_ part of it, and both the license and the community
came out really well in it.

What I'm happy about it is also that it was a defensive suit, and
quite frankly, when we talk about "going to war" and "nuclear
options", I have to say that "defensive" is also a big big positive.
Because offensive use of nuclear options is just a f*cking bad idea.
Seriously.

And to further take that example: it was also a very good example of
how companies really can help us. Any legal enforcement discussion
absolutely should *not* be about "how does the open source community
enforce the GPL against companies". That's just stupid talk, and makes
it be about "individuals vs companies", which IS NOT TRUE. That's
simply not how the community has worked in Linux, and it isn't how it
*should* work.

Seriously. I think we should see the IBM/SCO thing as an example of
how we should all wish the GPL is to be used.

Do I want some "community effort" to try to create a "GPL test case"
against some random badly behaving company that isnt' even all that
*meaningful* from a development standpoint? Hell no. Quite frankly,
anybody who sees that as a good end goal should haev their head
examined. Yet that seems to be what the SFC sees as their goal in
life.

We should put our goal posts in a totally different direction. We
don't have a ":community effort" to do marketing. We all realize how
completely idiotic and stupid that would be. A "Software Freedom
Marketing Center" would be laughed at.

Why the hell do people not laugh at it when it comes to legal issues?

The fact is, Linux is in a very different position than the one that
Jeremy Allison describes for samba. Or the one we were in 20 years
ago. We have very consciously tried to make various companies be
*part* of our community, and they have been an incredibly powerful
resource. They employ a lot of the engineers, but they do so much more
too.

So I seriously believe that we should not see companies as the "enemy"
and as a target of lawsuits. We should see the Linux companies as a
big part of the community, and as the natural *defender* of the GPL.

And we already have a really good example of that that people seem to
be ignoring.

I would really want people to completely change their thinking about
this "GPL enforcement" thing.

The great thing about the GPLv2 was how it turned copyright law
"against itself" (really just against traditional use of copyrigth)
and it has been described as a legal "judo move" - using copyright to
*open* software instead of using it as a way to *restrict* software.
It's why people call it "copyleft", after all.

THAT is the beauty of the GPLv2.

But the people who then see proprietary software as "evil", and see
companies as being amoral, and as the enemy (and this very much is how
rms and the FSF was acting), those people were doing exactly the wrong
thing, and I have been fighting that idiocy for as long as I've been
using the GPLv2.

The fact that we didnt' see proprietary software as evil, and that we
opened our arms to companies made all the difference.

Now those same small-minded people are making the SAME MISTAKE, all
over again. I do *not* want anybody who talks about "evil" proprietary
software to be the seen as the "protector" of the GPL. No, people who
talk about how proprietary software is "evil" should be seen as
*stupid* people. Because they are. We showed them wrong.

And similarly, we should *not* see this as some crazy "community is
protecting itself against companies" crap. Again, that's the stupid
and wrong-headed FSF thinking. It's bad.

We have a ton of companies that are part of the community, and the
same way we're bad at marketing and rely on companies to do that, we
should at least _strive_ to work towards companies doing legal
enforcement too.

That's the true "judo" move.

Because quite frankly, I think just by going by existing history,
companies are better at lawsuits than the community is anyway. Just
look at IBM.

                        Linus