[OT] The GPL and possible violations

[Joel Rees]

On 2006.2.21, at 04:20 AM, Mike McCarty wrote:

> Don Bedsole wrote:
>> Hi,
>
> Ok, taking the LGPL and GPL at face value,

... or not, as the case may be, ...

>  with what seems to be
> their intended interpretations, and presuming that the courts
> would actually enforce what they seem to say, and AIUI...
>
>> Ok, I have to admit, I have not been playing close attention to this 
>> discussion, but what I have seen has raised a question for me.  I 
>> would like a clarification.  Do I, as an end user have the right to 
>> install non-GPL software (e.g. RealPlayer) on my Linux box if it 
>> links to GPL software?  Can
>
> Yes. AFAICT, no restriction is placed on the receiver of bootleg

bootleg? Do you mean to imply the GPL is a means of stealing someone 
else's intellectual property or something?

> applications by either GPL or LGPL. OTOH, IANAL, and there may
> be *other* precedent which applies to such recipients.

???

>> I install non-GPL software which links to anything it wants to on my 
>> computer?
>
> With all caveats, yes. But remember, someone who knowingly receives
> stolen goods is known as a "fence" and commits an offence. I do not
> know what collateral effects there may be. But AFAICT, neither
> LGPL nor GPL prohibit that.

fah -- more gratuitous talk of stolen goods. Maybe it is you who wants 
to steal someone else's hard work?

> >  Is it legal for non-GPL software distributors (RealPlayer, et. al)
>> to furnish software to me which links to GPL software?  Wouldn't it 
>> only be a
>
> NO. This is precisely what is prohibited by GPL, and as I read it,
> also by LGPL.

He did not say _linked_, he said _links_. Can you read English? If it 
is distributed linked to GPL-ed software and is not licensed 
compatibly, that would be against the implicit contract of the GPL, but 
not necessarily the LGPL. If it is merely possible to link, that is 
explicitly allowed by the GPL. See the mention in the GPL of the header 
files if you don't understand why that would be.

There is a gray area involving distributing both the software which can 
be linked and the means to automatically link them without user 
intervention. (And that's the fine line FreeBSD gets ever so close to.)

>> problem if I were to somehow redistribute the non-GPL--GPL software 
>> combination?  In other words, can non-GPL distributors (again 
>> RealPlayer for example), give me whatever software they want to, 
>> which links to whatever it wants to, as long as I, the end-user, do 
>> not distribute the resulting GPL-non--GPL combination?  Thank you.
>
> No, they cannot. This is precisely what the GPL, and AIUI the LGPL
> prohibit.

And once again I must point out that your opinion is in direct 
contradiction with mine, unless you know of specific things which, say, 
RealPlayer is distributed pre-linked against, or, I suppose, if you 
know that RealPlayer is using some automatic linking mechanism that 
goes beyond the Linux link editor.

I hope you are over the sinus and the fevers, but if you've got the 
time to be posting such opinions, get the time to read up on copyright 
until you understand that software which is written to an API is not 
publishing either the API or the library which implements it.