On Jun 13, 2007, Daniel Forrest <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > 1.) I ship the device back to the manufacturer, they replace the ROM, > and ship it back to me.
> 2.) I ship the device back to the manufacturer, they load new code > into it, and ship it back to me. > How do these two differ? Or is it now just a question of the ROM > being in a socket? I can't see how the technicalities of how the > hardware is constructed can change the legality of the software. I don't see that they differ. If the software can be replaced, the manufacturer ought to tell you how to do it. It doesn't have to do it for you, it doesn't have to give you the hardware tools needed to do it, but if you're not able to start from the source code and the information provided by the manufacturer and get to a modified version of the software on the device, while the manufacturer could do it, then the manufacturer is locking you in, and therefore you're not free. This is a clear violation of the spirit of the license, even if the legalese might make room for some such misbehavior. -- Alexandre Oliva http://www.lsd.ic.unicamp.br/~oliva/ FSF Latin America Board Member http://www.fsfla.org/ Red Hat Compiler Engineer [EMAIL PROTECTED], gcc.gnu.org} Free Software Evangelist [EMAIL PROTECTED], gnu.org} - To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in the body of a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/
