Re: Dual-Licensing Linux Kernel with GPL V2 and GPL V3

David Woodhouse
2007-06-15T20:46:58Z

On Fri, 2007-06-15 at 13:34 -0700, Linus Torvalds wrote:
> I think that's a somewhat valid argument, although I'm not really sure
> whether there is any difference between, say, a Fedora 7 "livecd", and a
> router with a cramfs filesystem in rom.
>
> Both really work the same way, and both really are very much targeted
> towards a specific hardware platform.

I'm inclined to agree. And I'd probably suggest that the Fedora 7
'livecd' would be in violation of the GPL if it were to include the
binary-only modules, too. Enough people agree with me that we _don't_ in
fact include those modules. And other people have been convinced to
_stop_ shipping those modules, when once they did.

> So I would at least *personally* suggest that people not look into the
> license for these kinds of things, and also that you really need to have a
> very specific case, and just basically put it in front of a judge.

> At some point, *somebody* has to decide in a gray area, and I'm not saying
> that a judge is really _technically_ any better really to decide the
> issue, but at least he is hopefully _independent_ of both parties, so when
> a judge makes an arbitrary decision, the "arbitrariness" is hopefully at
> least somewhat "fair".

Indeed.

--
dwmw2