Re: GPL Violation?

[James Courtier-Dutton <James@superbug.co.uk>]

Arjan van de Ven wrote:
> On Wed, 2006-08-16 at 22:48 -0700, Anonymous User wrote:
>> I work for a company that will be developing an embedded Linux based
>> consumer electronic device.
>>
>> I believe that new kernel modules will be written to support I/O
>> peripherals and perhaps other things.  I don't know the details right
>> now.  What I am trying to do is get an idea of what requirements there
>> are to make the source code available under the GPL.
> 
> 
> you should talk to a lawyer, not LKML.
> 

The easiest, no need to talk to a lawyer, most economical, way out of
this is to simply make all source code open and published under the GPL
or GPL compatible license with the appropriate "signed-off" entries.

As soon as you start trying to release some part of it as binary code,
then lawyers have to be involved and that tends to cost a lot more.

People on this list are NOT lawyers, so don't ask about that option on
this list.

>From the business perspective, it is likely to be far more profitable to
 deliver an open source GPL licensed product to market, as you are then
likely to get a lot of free development effort work done for you by your
users.

James