In message <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Alex
Belits writes:
: Your attorneys are stupid.
Are they now? The GPL was designed to force companies to release
sources. The FSF put a lot of time and effort into it so that they
could force people to give back mods to gcc and the like. It was
applied to a kernel and who knows what that really means. With Emacs
or gcc it was clear where the boundaries of code where. It is less
clear with a kernel with dynamically loadable modules. The atterneys
stated that the risk was elevated substantially by using the GPL'd
kernel vs using one that wasn't.
The only reason that we haven't seen more lawsuits is because many
companies cave in under the pressure, or the original authors of the
software cannot afford atterneys to pursue the matter. IIRC, Donnald
Becker has desired for years to bring action against certain companies
that have taken his packet drivers, made them commercial or hacked
them for their own boards, and not released the sources. I heard nth
hand that this was because of lack of deep pockets to pursue them.
Warner
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