From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: from smtp1.linuxfoundation.org (smtp1.linux-foundation.org [172.17.192.35]) by mail.linuxfoundation.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id 68EA925A for ; Mon, 29 Aug 2016 21:52:24 +0000 (UTC) Received: from mail-yb0-f171.google.com (mail-yb0-f171.google.com [209.85.213.171]) by smtp1.linuxfoundation.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id D9526279 for ; Mon, 29 Aug 2016 21:52:23 +0000 (UTC) Received: by mail-yb0-f171.google.com with SMTP id 125so307411ybe.3 for ; Mon, 29 Aug 2016 14:52:23 -0700 (PDT) MIME-Version: 1.0 In-Reply-To: <20160829213128.fr3enaeso6r5s2ki@thunk.org> References: <20160827183550.GB1601@katana> <20160828074706.GB1370@kroah.com> <1472492553.32433.108.camel@redhat.com> <20160829213128.fr3enaeso6r5s2ki@thunk.org> From: Matthew Garrett Date: Mon, 29 Aug 2016 17:52:21 -0400 Message-ID: To: "Theodore Ts'o" Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 Cc: "Bradley M. Kuhn" , Linus Torvalds , ksummit-discuss@lists.linuxfoundation.org Subject: Re: [Ksummit-discuss] [CORE TOPIC] GPL defense issues List-Id: List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , On Mon, Aug 29, 2016 at 5:31 PM, Theodore Ts'o wrote: > If some competitor ran off with their code, companies like IBM and SGI > would be perfectly capable of suing their competitor. As Linus has > observed, companies like IBM are prefectly capable of deciding whether > or not a lawsuit is in their interest, and aggressively pursuing legal > action when it's called for. I'm a little confused here. Doesn't the argument that this would result in companies avoiding Linux in order to reduce their potential liability apply equally well in this case? If IBM showed willingness to sue people for JFS-related infringements, there's no fundamental reason to believe that they wouldn't be willing to do the same against any other competitor on broadly spurious grounds. The threat of being sued by IBM seems like a much stronger incentive to use something else than the threat of being sued by a small coalition of independent copyright holders.