Re: [PATCH] Blacklist binary-only modules lying about their license

Marc Boucher
2004-04-30T05:44:34Z

On Apr 30, 2004, at 12:43 AM, Sean Estabrooks wrote:
>
> Dear Marc,
>
> Who decided that the goal was to become ubiquitous at any cost? How
> are you so sure that removing the incentive/reward for hardware vendors
> to release open source drivers is best for Linux in the long run?

There are major chipset vendors out there who have managed to become
market leaders while not providing any drivers for Linux.

But other vendors are also still releasing new native linux drivers,
despite the availability of our solutions (Intel's project for Centrino
at ipw2100.sourceforge.net is a great example).

This essentially proves that we are not removing the incentive to do
proper native drivers, simply providing more options for 1) people who
would otherwise be stuck or unable to use the full functionality of
their machines under Linux right now, and 2) vendors who are not able
to afford or justify the cost of developing native linux drivers due to
the size of the current Linux desktop market. In general these vendors
plan to one day produce native drivers, once the numbers make it
possible.

Marc