| Novell/Microsoft patent deal doesn't violate GPL.... yet |
Nov. 29, 2006
Analysis -- It got little notice at the time, but Richard Stallman, the leader of the FSF (Free Software Foundation), said at the fifth international GPLv3 conference in Tokyo on Nov. 21 that the Novell/Microsoft patent agreement is not in violation of the GPL version 2.
Stallman, the primary author of the GNU General Public License (GPL), said, according to a transcript published by the FSF Europe, "What has happened is, Microsoft has not given Novell a patent license, and thus, section 7 of GPL version 2 does not come into play. Instead, Microsoft offered a patent license that is rather limited to Novell's customers alone."
Still, Stallman saw a silver lining in this dark cloud. "It turns out that perhaps it's a good thing that Microsoft did this now, because we discovered that the text we had written for GPL version 3 would not have blocked this, but it's not too late and we're going to make sure that when GPL version 3 really comes out it will block such deals. We were already concerned about possibilities like this, namely, the possibility that a distributor might receive a patent license which did not explicitly impose limits on downstream recipients but simply failed to protect them."
Thus, the next draft of the GPLv3 will block the kind of language used in the Novell/Microsoft agreement. Stallman explained, "We're going to say not just that if you receive the patent license, but if you have arranged any sort of patent licensing that is prejudicial among the downstream recipients, that that's not allowed. That you have to make sure that the downstream recipients fully get the freedoms that they're supposed to have. The precise words, we haven't figured out yet. That's what Eben Moglen [FSF's general counsel] is working on now."
Ever since the Novell/Microsoft patent deal was announced, there has been a great deal of heated debate over Novell's agreement. The Samba Group wants Novell to just walk away from the deal, for example. Ubuntu's chief tried to poach developers from Novell/SUSE. And, open-source luminary Bruce Perens started a petition that accuses Novell of betraying the free software community.
Others, such as The Linux Information Project, a Linux information site, have defended the deal. On the site, the owners declared that "The agreement itself, as well as its timing and comments made by Microsoft executives about it, may actually be a very good thing -- and perhaps even worthy of celebration!"
Others, like IBM, believe that there was no point to the patent agreement. Scott Handy, IBM's VP of Worldwide Linux and Open Source said, "We have never seen any need for patent protection for Linux, and we don't see any need for it now." Still, Handy believes that the rest of Novell and Microsoft's agreements will help Linux to grow ever larger.
Regardless of how one sees the deal, however, if the founder of the GPL believes that it's legal under the current GPL, we can only conclude that, for now, the Novell/Microsoft patent deal will continue to stand.
-- Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols
Special Report: Novell and Microsoft Collaborate on Linux
For lots of background on the Novell/Microsoft Linux deal, visit Linux-Watch.com's reading list, here.
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