Subscribe to our weekly newsletter to get such interviews in your inbox: www.tfir.io/tfir-daily-newsle... Linus says that GPL V3 is a neat licence but it violates everything that V2 stood for.
He is very calm and rational about his talks what I seen so far. I think the crazy talks where he isn't calm are the ones that will be cut down to the crazy part and shared most. Because those are the parts that generate traffic.
In general, particularly now, he seems to be respectful in person but honest. He almost always seems to admit his own limitations to the point of self-denegration many times, even calling himself "a really unpleasant person" and "I'm not a visionary" and "I'm not technical", and ends discussion of his points by saying things like, "but that's just me and other people are different," and even things like, "those differences have turned out to be a good thing for Linux." He may have calmed down with age, of course, as well. He even says that those times he makes very harsh comments are obviously hyperbole and it just comes with passion. I personally don't agree with using those comments but I agree with the point about respect needing to be earned and not immediately given (in the realm of the technical; I think all people deserve respect, empathy, etc. outside of that (which is why I would probably be more tactful myself, but also why I can empathesize with him saying those comments; it's a different vernacular, and as he says, you find the people with whom you want to work and part of that is sharing that perspective and vernacular).) I mean, even with regards to the infamous "Tanenbaum-Torvalds Debate," says he holds no hostility towards Tanenbaum. I think overall, even though he says he is not a "people person," he actually shows quite a bit of empathy without compromising his own values. I have seen him a little more aggressive, saying things like "F*** NVIDIA" and such. But again, I think that's just part of how he talks. He deals in the abstract of ideas for the most part (not that I'm "inside his brain," but it seems he is not thinking of the people he is hurling the insults towards as "people," (and we all objectivify each other and ourselves to a large degree in any domain; we're too complex to think about everything) but rather sources of ideas, perhaps), recognizes that he isn't always tactful (although often is), and is passionate.
@@math3matics I agree with what you are saying. I also don't think he ever was really 'hostile'. I just think if you look at the history of Linux it's in essence a hobby project which gained A LOT of traction. I think it's like with a lot of other stuff like python, perl or php for example. The people who started them did not do so with the thought of widespread implementation. A lot were and still are just people with technical knowledge who tried to solve a problem they had. And just because a person has expertise in one field does by no means mean that they are some kind of genius. And a lot of people might just underestimate how hard good communication is. So I think Linus shouldn't be seen as some kind of bad spokesperson or something. I think he is more so a passionate programmer who happens to be demanded to speech in public. But even if I think that the public image is always sensationalised... I feel like he has really calmed down a bit over the years. If you look at the mailing lists and stuff like that as well.
"strong opinions" ^^ One might not be on the same side as Linus but I really like that he can (and always does) give you logical arguments for his strong opinions :)
+wullxz without a doubt. I'm not exactly a Linus fan (I actually think he's a total dick), but I can absolutely not argue with his logic. He does have logical and understandable points for all his opinions and I respect him for saying them out loud and as a programmer.
The problem with Linus is having opinions about topics he is absolutely an idiot in. Legally speaking the lack of consequences in GPLv2, leads to a situation where it is relatively hard to get a judge to order an injuction (because the licence doesn't contain the right to injunction). When the licence include a injunction-on-violation clause, it's a LOT easier to get a judge to grant your injunction, because it's the automatic legal consequence all parties agreed to. The lack of formal consequences on violation, is a flaw in GPLv2. Not a feature. But Linus has more legally flawed interprentation of the law and licences: - He thinks the GPL allows him to open up certain hooks into the kernel to other (non-gpl) (combined)modules. It doesn't. (even though I do agree it should) - He thinks the GPL allows him to use in-code declaration to open up certain kernel "hooks" to non-gpl modules, but prevent the use of others. It doesn't. (even if the GPL allowed the first bulletin, it still doesn't allow adding additional restrictions byond GPL, which he would be doing here) Simply put: GPLv2 is a VERY BAD licence to use for libraries and kernels specifically. No sane legal professional would advice anyone to use GPL(v2) for use in Kernels and Libraries. What he is doing here is presenting his own incompetence in legal maters as "features". Which he shouldn't, simply because he educates people and he doesn't have the knowhow to do so.
That's not a fair argument as that's not what "versioning" implies. Versioning explicitly implies "this version is equivalent to the previous but newer an improved" or the older version is "outdated and superceded" If it has a different purpose it should have a different name.
@@justincameron9123 certainly a higher version implies the lower version is superseded, but you can argue the other side is not true if you want to take it in bad faith
I know it's late but I can't help but watch this from time to time and Linus really is legendary. I like his "roughness" tbh. Sometimes it is a bit offensive true, but such is life, you gotta be able to take hard critique and get back up, unfortunately. And sometimes such rough talk is a good slap to the face so you wake up.
Why unfortunately? Absolutely nothing gets done if everyone is a fraudulent nice guy. Why fraudulent, because five minutes later they invariably try to socially pressure you to do their bidding without admitting that's exactly what they are trying to do.
I truly respect him for that. He is honest and doesnt hold back about his feelings and views. I actually find it quite normal and how it should be done. I have the feeling while americans are more confused by it, europeans get it a bit more. (I'm german for example) ... But that's just a guess.
Nothing's late with on demand video! But I (believe I) completely agree with you, and would even say he's not even really that "rough" (and I like that you put it in quotes). When people say that he is "tactless" or "rough" or whatever, to me it's just a set of valid principles (respect needing to be earned, etc.) and a vernacular that is not meant to be taken literally ("how are you still alive being that stupid," etc.). He actually is quite tactful, IMO, without comprising his values. For instance, in this video, he is very polite to the person who asked the question but stated his opinion honestly, and then ended with, "but that's just me". He even said that GPLv3 is a fine license, it's just not GPL and thus shouldn't be called v3 of it. He'll even admit his weaknesses often (I believe even saying he would die on an island if he had to write a good looking GUI) and also say that it's good to have multiple perspectives working on a project (although I believe that's in another video or interview, one in which he talks about how he changed his perspective on involving others and matured, thus admitting he had a poor perspective before, etc.). He may appear tactless in text based communications (mailing lists and forums and such) but it's always hard to judge tone and in those forums, without a physical person there, you're more in the realm of abstract ideas. I may not use the same rhetoric as him but I am completely empathetic to it.
@@RiversJ That's a great point. Most people who want to get things done but also be nice will end up just trying to manipulate you via that kindness, which is very deceptive and, I would consider, even worse from a morality perspective than being "harsh" or "tactless" or however people want to label Linus.
"Im sure some of them are good people, but most of the people they are sending are murders and rapists and we have to secure our community. We have to build a firewall." -Linus Torvalds
Freedom has (or should always have) limits. Does Linus take these limits in account? (that's a real question - I've stopped listening to him a long time ago)
Well also, one you accepted a bunch of patches for your own OpenSource project, you can't change your choice either (unless you get all submitters you got changes from agree with your change of choice)
GPLv2 seems the best license. I've noticed with more liberal licenses like BSD, MIT, etc, is that companies then make proprietary versions and don't contribute all code back. So for example PostgreSQL has companies that contribute to the open source version, but also sell their proprietary versions with extensions that they keep closed. If Linus had gone with a BSD type license you'd have proprietary versions of Linux with, say, custom and closed source file systems. GPLv2 means everything is open sourced.
GPLv3 is better, because it prevents Tivoization & hardware DRM that affects the software. GPL is about guaranteeing & spreading end-user freedom/liberty, not necessarily developers getting their code back which is just a byproduct.
I don’t think your last point is entirely correct. As far as I understand the license, only the kernel would be covered by the “copyleft” clauses, not user space. So any changes to kernel code must be made open, but that wouldn’t prevent a company from making a distribution with a number of essential user space components published as closed source. I mean isn’t this what Android does by making essential libraries closed source? That’s why Replicant basically had to reimplement most of the standard libraries and other essential components in their free version of Android.
@@phillafco1039 Yes but even the kernel gets forked and made proprietary with a liberal license. GPL ensures there's a single community coding the same codebase.
@@RiversJ "arrogance is being presumptuous or obnoxious while your conjecture Is correct/superior" where do you get these definitions? "while your conjecture Is correct/superior" it has nothing to do with that, arrogance is a behavior attribute, has nothing to do with being right or wrong.
Tivoisation is also a problem with nearly all tablet computers and “smartphones” and even some laptops. It’s impossible for the user to replace Android or iOS on these devices with something else, like some regular GNU/Linux distro. Thus development of free software for these devices is stalled. And maybe even at some point, you won’t be able to buy a normal computer anymore, one that isn’t locked down. It’s a dystopian development.
He seems to agree with that. His point is that shouldn't be up to the owners of the software to decide. His idea is "I make open source software, anyone can use it". He doesn't want to add caveats or conditions to using the software. The only condition he has is to publicise any improvements you make.
@@qutuz9495 Yup. That's what I got from the video as well. I do rather get his point - even though the free software on the device now can't be freely developed anymore, it doesn't stop his base intent with free software: That anyone can use the software & if they do they must submit the patches back. The fact that the hardware isn't free doesn't change the "freeness" of the software - the code is still available for people to put into their own hardware if they want.
@@qutuz9495 He also cares much more about the rights of the developers than the users. Which makes sense, he's sunk a lot of his life into a handful of software projects and wants to protect and enable the developers of those. Why does he care whether you can modify your Tivo?
I suppose he's allowed to ask a new question only when there's nobody else to ask questions, because the talk still has time and it's better to have a question than not lol
@@9001greg You do ought to provide evidence for how/why GPLv3 is “communist”, even if the text of the GPLv3 itself is readily available. (Or even how/why communism is a bad thing or an antithesis to freedom, as it seems like you believe it is.) My understanding of communism (as a non‐communist) does not align with your view/statement, so I would like to see your sources for why you believe this to be the case.
that remains the fundamental agreement, except gpl3 recognizes the reality that a permissive license on its own does not guarantee that source code is free to use, a fact which companies like microsoft are eager to exploit to enclose the commons
Plus it was impractically impossible to get all the developers to agree to v3. In fact the FSF screwed the pooch on v3, the industry weight switched behind BSD style licences leading to embrace, extend and don't share the code back.
Additionally if you're a commercial company, you don't want the software you build a product on to be subject to license changes imposing new conditions. Especially by a small organisation with opaque governance.
Wow, it is amazing how a community changes with time and generation. I think the comments section should just be 'Let's bag Linus'. Self entitled idealism. It's not wrong to want to change the world, but someone with a differing opinion than yours is not automatically a lesser being. Society has somehow changed from discussing differing opinions and debate as a good thing and turned it into a skewering by popularity. Breaks the heart to watch. Especially when you can tell some of the intellectual dishonesty taking place along the way. What a waste. Watch the whole video - the guy adamantly expresses these are his opinions and that he sees the benefits of other options.
The problem is, there can be only so much "differing opinions and debate" if you wish to get anything done. When in a common effort, you have to share the effort's goals to be able to and have the motivation to contribute productively. So, the more people share a project's goals and/or vision, the more current and potential contributors that project has. Which is FOSS world is everything -- that's where "popularity" of ideas comes to play.
It may make more sense to you when you factor in the vast commercial market, which contributes the largest volume of quality code back to the project. Don't get too hung up on free as in beer - v3 restricts what should and so far always has been free. At some point the FSF needs to understand and acknowledge that their position is wrong, so those of us whose livelihoods (producing free software) depend on licenses to allow us to do what we do. The motivation to contribute productively is some times, ok let's be real, in most cases today, is money/paycheck. There is nothing wrong with this but the FSF seems to think that there is, and they are just wrong. The license wars were theirs to lose... and incredibly, they did that. Self-righteous hubris is never a good thing, I don't know how they expected the whole world to join them in that direction.
In my opinion everyone is entitled to their own view. Impracticality SHOULD NOT be able to change that, so 'there can be only so much "differing opinions and debate"' to me is an extremely dangerous way of thinking. Sacrificing human rights for practicality....That is wrong on soo many levels. That sometimes we choose things by majority to get things done does not mean that there can only be soo much differeing opinions and debate and it certainly does not mean that other opinions (outside of the soo much box) do not count, which your statement I quoted earlier implies. I really hope you only meant to say that we sometimes need to make decision that does not match some peoples view instead of saying there can only be soo much... because that last idea gives me chills to the bone. And I know I am kinda contradicting my own point of free visions. But Denying other people their human right to me is the only opinion no one should have. Would make the world a much better place.
If Minix was GPL v3 instead of BSD, maybe the Intel IME and the AMD PSP fiascos wouldn't be what they are right now..? Even more likely, perhaps if Linux was GPL v3 instead of v2, Android phones would be a lot easier to flash. My last two phones have no drivers available, so I'm stuck with the vendor version. If I want it to have more than 2 hours battery, have a functional touchscreen, sensors and GPS, or even work as a phone, that is. Otherwise, I can painstakingly change the OS, and have a tiny PDA without keys, if I manage not to brick it in the process, yay!
stop doing substances, he made a humongous contribution to humanity, but your comment is off like you where aiming to Mars from Atlantic ocean, you ended up in the Pacific and getting to Alpha centauri... Yes I had to exaggerate
medical equipment should not have locked down software running on them. Policy makers don't understand the implications of locked down hardware and walled gardens, vendor lockins, and waste of public money going that route
well opensource is a double edged sword if you have software that is scarecly examined for bugs then opensource is more of a security issue then benefit and i think that is why medical equipment and its software is locked down
how about electric meters, or ATMs, or credit-card terminals or other security devices? the day that companies are not allowed to harden their devices against attack when running linux is the day that they stop running linux.
@@Spongman Security through obscurity is hardly security. Having things be open source means that they can be checked to make sure the code has secure protocols. The code that you use is not the data that you use (which is what the code should be able to protect). When you don’t make your code open source, and you give that locked-down hardware to another company, you aren’t going to face more than the slap on the wrist that the credit rating agencies got hit with for releasing hundreds of millions of personally identifying information via channels which only they were able to see the code for! The incentives to have secure code simply don’t exist for code that is not open source.
@@evannibbe9375 " Security through obscurity is hardly security. " People say that, but in practice you look at e.g. some commonplace symmetric-key crypto algorithm like AES-256 and you see just how easy it is to inadvertently insert backdoors into it to the point where you need quite a bit of expertise just to roll some canned version of the thing without ending up vulnerable to a padding oracle attack or the like. If you rolled your own shitty homebrew algorithm you'd be SOL if someone managed to figure it out and find an attack but you're still probably better off with that than with a substandard implementation of something well-known. There's a lot of nuance in the discussion that's completely steamrolled by adages like "security through obscurity is no security at all".
The main difference is that for Linus FSF is just a tool for making big and complex software development available for a common programming enthusiast or a small company, to make real programming more accessible to people and to use their efforts for making it even more accessible in the future. Just because programming is fun and big programming is even more fun. But for FSF all the software including Linux kernel itself is not so important bu itself, for them it is just an example for how things should be done overall, it is just a just a tool for moving torwards their political goals, to their bright ideals of global information freedom. Linus just does not care about the big picture, he cares much more about what he personally can create and what would benefit other people like him. He is a professional not a politician and he does not want to expose his projects to new risks just for the sake of some dreams. And who knows if it is a right decision or not but it is absolutely an understandable one.
Linus' way worked, compare Linux to GNU Hurd. Linus' pragmatic approach that doesn't hate all companies allows Linux to be the kernel for mobiles and servers. Otherwise it would be a tiny niche noone cares about.
@@oliverford5367 It was not the license, it was the development model. GNU was using a trusted volunteers model - like BSD with a stronger license - at the time. Linus figured out how to scale the "send patches" model, and once GNU followed suit (they kept copyright assignment for a long time, so not 100% buy in) their scope and pace also expanded explosively. But by that point Linux had become the definitive GPL kernel. So GNU software became significant in the rest of the system - and there's a lot of it.
There is a 3-clause (the original one) and a 2-clause license (the "fixed" one). The third clause required a mention of the author in all products using the software. While this was sensible long ago ("pay by honoring") in practice with modern GNU/Linux systems where there is a huge amount of different software projects incorporated it becomes quite unpractical, that is "non-usable". Personally I like the MIT(Expat) license more, because it's written in a more modern way, but 2-clause BSD is fine too. (PS: What I mean by more modern, the license is written in a way, that first sentence it takes everything away from you, and then explicitly gives you each freedom right to use, right to copy, right to modify, etc. It's more future safe in a sense if there are things we can't think of yet)
@@georgelionon9050 , I think, you are talking about 4-clause BSD. 3-clause BSD doesn't have a requirement of mentions. Also, 3-clause BSD is still used by such companies as Google.
He speaks his mind and people don't like that. He also just gets on with it and doesn't care really who he offends along the way. I have great admiration for him as a developer.
I recently saw videos with him and I was suprised to see Linus is a twat and unnecessary rude, and I will explain why. So people can understand, being upfront/direct is very good, but unnecessary insulting and putting down people is a bad thing, and only a moron does that, and Linus did that on more occasions. And is not about being soy-boy like some asskissing fans say here, it's about self-respect and not accepting a person to talk so rude to you like saying "you should be retroactively aborted", Linus is truly a disgusting person with unnecessary insults like this. Also professional achievements are not an excuse to personal bad behaviour.
GPLv2 is mostly about copyright - you're allowed to use, change, and redistribute the software you got. GPLv3 adds some gnarly anti-patent stuff, allowing anyone to come after companies who distribute GPLv3 software, if they have any patents - even patents that have nothing to do with the software.
@@senseisecurityschool9337 Isn't it the opposite? As far as I understand this, if the company distributes the code under GPLv3, it cannot sue anyone using this code in any way, even if the code (or a portion of it) is covered by company's patents. fsfe.org/activities/gplv3/patents-and-gplv3.en.html#Explicit-patent-grant
@@konstantincanaglia4089 Right, if a company mirrors any GPLv3 software, all patents owned by the company, including totally unrelated divisions of the company, are threatened. Anyone can just commit some random module that uses their patent, and because some dev somewhere in the company mirrored the git repo, the company loses the ability to enforce the patent.
As long as GPLv2 allows Linus to do what he needs to keep developing the Linux kernel I am fine with it. The only way he'll ever move on to say GPLv3 or onwards is if a loophole in GPLv2 stops him from developing the Linux kernel... Adding more lines of legal insanity to the mother load of text that is the GPL license these days ain't going to drive up insensitive to invest into open source. Its why licenses like the BSD license grew so popular among corporate entities, people who use your code want as little restrictions posed on them specifically as possible.
Linus can't change the license of the kernel anymore either. Unless each and everyone having provided patches for it agrees with the change. The kernel is locked into GPLv2 for good. If there happens to be a loophole in future then Linus dug the grave by disallowing followup licenses as replacement.
Well, BSD licence etc is popular with corporate entities because they want to use and make money with other people's work without giving back any of their own work. At the end of the day a company is a company: "I have something you don't have and you have to pay me lots of money to be allowed to use it." That doesn't work if they give that something back.
@@georgelionon9050 A key feature of humanity is that ideologies decay. Corruption corrupts, money monetizes, and usurpers usurp. Loopholes don't even need to be real for a sufficiently large cadre of lawyers to poke holes in any document. So, why make it even easier by letting them change the document itself? Someday, what you posit will happen. But some of the largest corporations - and governments - on this entire planet use Linux. _They have more lawyers._
@@georgelionon9050 Actually, he can. The entire Kernel is not GPLv2, and Linus has proprietary rights to some of it, copyrights, trademarks that are all his, and it's not like if he went with a better more agreeable license, he'd be alone on it. So if he changes the license on his code, that in no way means it changes anyone else's who contributed, but by contributing they made their work FOSS, and the Kernel team could technically do what Google did to Linux in making Android. If he goes with a different license, and requires contributors to adopt the new license for every new code, over time it will replace all of the old GPL stuff.
Summary: Linus Torvalds and Richard Stallman are two highly influential, important figures in the history of open-source/free software. Stallman developed a set of tools that comprise the user space of an operating system, GNU. His ultimate goal was a fully free and/or open-source operating system. He also developed a license, GPL, that stipulates that anyone who distributes any changes based off GPL-licensed software must make the source code available. It also stipulates that any changes to those changes, changes to the changes to the changes, and so on, must also have source code available. Think of it like this: when you use the GPL license, you're basically putting a hex on your software that ensures that any other software that decides to incorporate your code will be cursed into legally having to have its source code publicly available to anyone in perpetuity. GNU was licensed under GPL. Torvalds developed an operating system kernel, Linux. He liked the philosophy of GPL, so he used it for Linux. A GPL-licensed kernel was the one thing that Stallman was missing to achieve his goal of creating an OS that is fully free to modify and use as one pleases, so he used Linux to complete the GNU/Linux operating system that we know and love today, which is free and open source. Tivo sold a product, a DVR, that runs GNU/Linux. Even though they complied with all of GPL's stipulations, the physical device which runs GNU/Linux kept the user from making changes. This is what Stallman refers to as "Tivoization." This new development conflicts with Stallman's philosophy of users being allowed to make whatever changes they want to software on devices they purchased, so he created a revision to GPL, GPLv3, which adds a new stipulation: any device sold with GPLv3 licensed software must allow the user to make changes to the software on the device. Torvalds does not agree with this philosophy. He was on the same page as Stallman when the stipulation was just making your source code available, but he does not agree that device manufacturers should have to give you the ability to make changes on the hardware they sell to you. In his view, the original philosophy was good because it ensured the software always remained free, but the new one is overreaching because it puts restrictions on hardware. He thinks the hardware is a completely separate beast that is none of his business to make stipulations about; he's a software guy through and through. According to Torvalds, Stallman tried very hard to get him to update Linux's license to GPLv3, even using deceit. Torvalds did not like this. Torvalds also recognizes that forcing hardware manufacturers to let users modify the software is not realistic in a world dominated by Disney and Comcast, who would rather just not use Linux at all than comply with Stallman's restrictions. Not to mention cell phone manufacturers would not be able to keep users from modifying their phones if they wanted to use Linux (which Android is based on). So, Torvalds addresses the philosophical side of things as well as the pragmatic side of things in his argument.
Use GPLv3 for: - Software - Plugins - Add-Ons Use LGPLv3 for: - Libraries - Add-Ons (if is like library) Use MIT, BSD, Apache, CC0 for: - Small code - Medium & Below medium sized libraries - Tutorials - Templates
@@powerfulaura5166 Ridiculous. That's absolutely ridiculous. I release my source code under the MIT license because it's less restrictive, and a lot of companies won't let you use GPL'd software (somehow they ignore g++). I don't really blame them. As a dev, I hate the GPL on libraries. According to GNU themselves: using the Lesser GPL permits use of the library in proprietary programs; using the ordinary GPL for a library makes it available only for free programs. This is deliberate on their part. They're trying to make an advantage for free developers over devs that are actually paid to produce software. I'm more than happy to use GPL'd tools (like g++ and gnu make), but I won't use GPL'd libraries. I won't even take the time to decide if they're useful, even for my open-source projects, because I don't want to spend time learning a library that I can't use for my day job. Furthermore, I hate how the GPL acts like a virus. Pull in a GPL'd library, and now your entire project has to be GPL'd. It doesn't matter if you prefer another license. But as for my end users -- my end users are other developers. And I'm giving them MORE freedom than the GPL does. I'm not out there trying to advance the GNU manifesto. Frankly, I don't agree with it. If you do, that's great. GPL everything you like. But I'm giving my users more freedom than you are.
Вообще-то GPL3 только прикрывает лазейки, при помощи которых обходят GPL2. По изначальному замыслу, авторы GPL2 не хотели давать такие лазейки (патенты, заблокированный загрузчик), просто тогда они не знали, что так будет. У них для более мягких ограничений есть LGPL, для более жёстких - Affero.
+LinucNerd The GPL is Stallman's attempt at passing totalitarian-style communist off as "Freedom". GPLv2 was a popular Stallman attempt at this. However, people started finding loopholes in GPLv2 that allowed them to do things that Stallman didn't like. Normally, if one believes in real, actual Freedom they are perfectly fine with allowing others to do what they want. However, Stallman doesn't believe in real, actual freedom. He wants to control what freedom people enjoy. Thus, he decided he needed create the GPLv3 - which has even more strings attached to how to use software.
+Reginald Greene The GPL doesn't try to influence the economy in any way. For a software license to influence the economy, you must legally connect the license to the control of money... And that's exactly how proprietary software was born. So if a license is to be associated with totalitarianism, it's got to be a proprietary software license, not one that has nothing to do with the control of money.
+Johnny English Your argument is barely coherent English. I don't expect someone defending the totalitarian GPL to use good logic... but at least they should try to construct coherent sentences...
You didn't get the point. GPL requires that any work you made which is based on some other GPL work should also be release under GPL. That's why GPL is considered totalitarian or communism or virus. That's why many devs prefers to distribute their open-source work under permissive licenses such BSD. That is: take the work (source code included) and do what you want, just mention my name somewhere (coyright holder). That's it. You can take my work to create some other open source software or proprietary software, it doesn't matter.
I know micro$oft is shady as shit, seeing they steal, but they also are able to gather copy-pasted ideas into very stable development environments. I'll give them that. Problem is now micro$oft is trying to take over open source software (seeing how they adamantly negated any GNU GPL v2, and they ended up acquiring GNU GPL v3), I wouldn't be impressed if they found a way to find something in GPL v3 they'd "suddenly love it". The difference between those is that (GPL v3) involved IPs inherit the "viral" clause from the GPL v2 + original IP patents rights are kept by the owner, so if indirectly "upgrading" GPL v3, and some IP from other licenses that may belong to original owner, enforces the license disagreement through any agreeable terms in the scope on GPL v3 but NOT the owner license scope(ding ding, microsoft), their IP has the right to do so, and the GPL v3 won't be in effect unless you: either *(1) cause the Corresponding Source to be so available*, or *(2) arrange to deprive yourself of the benefit of the patent license for this particular work*, or *(3) arrange, in a manner consistent with the requirements of this License, to extend the patent license to downstream recipients* Since Micro$oft won't hesitate to send to court anyone that may they find a risk, they will scrap the 3) inmediately or "conform an agreement, where your software would have to give up on any GPL v3 extension that may extend from theirs", the 1)also, since they rely on Windows Kernel as a base for everything, and that is not open source. No doubt they are already open sourcing parts that rely on closed source code. So the coverage is only for the open source part, specifically a software license (entirely different from an IP or trademark), but not their original license part that belongs to them. Also, there is a clause in GPL v3 that prevents you from using/transporting GPL v3 code from a third party, if you already have an agreement with another third party. Unless the third party is the same, or both third parties agreed to, and you are included. (ie, you work at AMD, want to use patches from Windows, but then want to relicense these changes). You'd need AMD and Micro$oft to agree a relicense, where you, the coder are using their GPL v3 .
So: If you have no desire to support GPL v3: use GPL v2 only . If you upgraded to GPL v3 please use GPL v2 or later license. That way they can adjust to your GPL v2 license and they are obligued to work on GPL v3. You then can say your code is GPL v2 and GPL v3 compatible, but still GPL v2, since GPL v2 and GPL v3 clauses are non-compatible. Making it "read-only source code" or protecting your work if external licenses are voided and your work is fully compliant with their GPL v3 parts
*GPLv3's DRM clause isn't a restriction on any freedom*. It grants more freedom, it doesnt deprive any. It simply allows people to legally break the DRM. However the tivoisation clause is a restriction of freedom because it restricts with what the developer can do with the code.
Then they are simply not used by the owner. But according to the GPLv2 you still have to make your modified sourcecode available should anybody want to have a copy. And you also need to include a statement that you modified the code so that your change is not misattributed to the original developer.
The improvements don't replace anything, they just have to be made public. The original owner, or anyone else, is free to use whichever version they please.
Honestly think about where we would be now without the enthusiasm of these open source/free spftware giants like Stallman and Torvalds. How unchecked software couldve been if the movement never caught on, and how locked down amd violated we as users would be. Its already bad enough as it is. Thanks to all those great people.
I admire this guy since I was young and installed Linux 0.99 from a new thingy called distro - Soft Landing Software! :) I don't really necessarily agree with everything he says, but I respect him by saying it - it made be to think, and by thinking, I could put my own convictions in check and get rid of the wrong ones. A agree with him about the GPLv3 - I'm still using GPLv2 due these reasons. A also agree that sometimes FSF goes borderline and somewhat bigotry. But I also agree that they have reasons for doing that (not all disclosable at that time), and also acknowledge that people make mistakes now and then - and this is the reason I do not fully agree with Linus about his feelings about FSF. When fighting monsters, you need to care to do not become one too - and I'm pretty sure that now and them, as any other Human Being, people at FSF crossed that line a bit. I know I did. It's interesting to note that less than 2 years ago, RMS was caught in a PR trap and had to resign from his position on the FSF due public pressure - a pretty low blow did probably by some Billionaire from the Software Industry in reprisal of a talk RMS did on his former Company - that thing happening 1 week after the talk is too much of a smoking gun to be ignored (but also so much of a smoking gun that it can had be used to hit that same billionaire, so i choose to avoid naming him). Linus himself was also targeted once, and had to be alway from the Kernel for some months. Given the current state of affairs, it's understandable a lot of not exactly nice things FSF did in the past. And it's due these reasons I also respected these guys a lot (and do my best to be not on their bad side, by Turing's sake, you can bet you ass I play straight on everything related to GPL!!)
The simple solution? More licenses and let the programmers decide. Then when the most popular licenses are tallied, they will become common knowledge for their nitch.
The better solution: get a law passed to remove the DMCA’s soft ban on reverse engineering, and ban companies like Apple and Google from making devices that don’t have terminals that allow users to write their own code for the device.
Honestly, GPLv3 is bad. It just turns people away from your project like Apple dropped Bash because of GPLv3. People don't want to deal with the extra restrictions that are not even that important. Why would you care about someone locking your software via hardware? What are the chances of this happening and if it does do you really care?
@@Tetex It only turns people away from my project that I couldnt care less about. It they cant even bother to let users use my code however they want, why would i bother letting them do so? GPLv3 ensures maximum freedom for everyone.
It can be hard to definite "bigotry": one man's righteous crusade is another man's totalitarianism. He's saying that _as he interprets it_ the FSF's trajectory is a bit too ideological in a way that doesn't benefit end-users the way the EFF's current trajectory is and does
@@codegeek98 I know I'm two years late but Linus didn't talk at all about end-users in this speech, and only about developers. He's not stupid, he wouldn't claim that GPLv3 hurts end-users when it very obviously doesn't. The only people who GPLv3 hurts are those who seek to restrict user freedom.
i have to admit i agree with stallman. the word 'freedom' keeps coming up again and again, and i get it's a hard topic, but i just feel like the gpl is a licence that protects users freedom, so it does make sense for it to not allow taking someone else's freedom. you are *not* free to take someone else's freedom. i mean, should you have the "freedom" to kill enslave someone? no, because everyone should be free to live and not be a slave, and that implies protecting that freedom from those who want to take it away, and this is undebatable. so i also think the same should apply to software. no one should have the power (or 'freedom') to take someone else's freedom to study, run, modify, distribute, and/or sell free software.
@@thereddrob imagine being this disingenuous. you know i'm not arguing that. all i'm saying is the gpl is a licence that *protects* people's freedom. that means it cannot allow people taking away the freedoms it gives, otherwise it'd be useless. i made the comparison with slavery and murder to help illustrate why it would be useless and those two examples are pretty much undebatable. i don't think anyone would say people should have the right to kill or enslave people. the right to live implies you don't have the ‘freedom to kill’, and the right to not be property of someone implies no one has the ‘freedom to enslave people’. in other words, sometimes freedom of something implies taking that freedom away is forbidden. that's the principle i was trying to illustrate with those examples. the gpl uses that principle to make sure people have the freedoms it gives, and i think it's really important to have that in mind when taking specifically about the version 3 because people were arguing (including linus) that companies like tivo had the right to use their hardware to prevent people from modifying the software. i don't think they're right. one of the freedoms the gpl gives is the freedom to modify the software. but the tivo was doing prevented that freedom, which made the licence useless. people like linus say the gpl is just about ensuring you have the changes people made to the software available, but that's not true. sure, you have the changes back, but that's not the reason it exists. the gpl has always been about freedom (in this case freedom regarding software, but freedom nevertheless). it would be disingenuous the argue it's not - just look at what the fsf, the nonprofit that makes the gpl, advocates for. even if you don't agree with the reasons why the fsf put that anti-tivoisation clause there, saying the ‘gplv3 violates everything that gplv2 stood for’ is either being ignorant or dishonest.
Was it really that hard to agree with him on something? I find myself agreeing with Linus on almost all topics, *except* for the way he sometimes expresses himself.
I think the reason Sony and Apple chose BSD over Linux is because under BSD license you can take the code, modify it and make it proprietary. If they chose Linux their code would have to be open source and in Apple's case people would just copy macOS features and add to their own Desktop Environments and make Apple's product less desirable in the process because you would be able to get something very similar for free.
I would be inclined to believe that a company like Sony(who makes the playstation) would prefer to use software under the GPLv2 license rather than GPLv3 since v2 seems to be less restrictive. From what Tetex is saying, I take it that they chose BSD because it's even less restrictive, in a way that matters to them. Though perhaps you(Amit) are talking about some other reason?
Yes, the BSD style licenses mean that companies make proprietary versions. GPLv2 means there is a common codebase that lots of people use. Vanilla FreeBSD isn't widely used party because Apple, Sony, etc take bits of it and make them proprietary.
Why would he not get code back in gplv3? He speaks about that he does not get code from drivers and firmware built on a v3 fork. Why? Isn't that not possible in v3? V3 also has a copyleft.
I think he meant that if it's code licensed under GPL v3 exclusively, he can't add it to the kernel, because it's GPL v2. I don't know how it works, I believe the issue would be that v3 could apply extra restrictions over the rest of the code.
First of all, the Linux kernel is GPLv2 only, not GPLv2+, so there is no such thing as a v3 fork of the Linux kernel-that is not allowed. What he was referring to is the claim made to him by someone in the FSF that he could use the GPLv3 but invalidate the "no tivoization" clause. In other words, he could release the code under GPLv3, but also grant users the right to use the code in a tivoized fashion, if they want (which would not be allowed under the plain text of GPLv3). However, if he did this, someone else could fork the kernel and make changes and release them under the FULL text of the GPLv3-including the tivoization clause. He would not then be able to integrate those changes, because tivoization would not be allowed on the changes, and he would have no legal standing to grant the right of tivoization to others *on the changes* - only for his own code. It helps to understand what tivoization means. It's about hardware lockdown. In a nutshell, if a hardware manufacturer makes it so that their hardware will only run signed versions of the software, and so that they (the manufacturer) has to sign any modified software version before it will run on the hardware they made-then it's called "tivoized." In such a case, if you have the source code of the software, but not the signing key, you can make changes all you like BUT you won't be able to run the modified software on hardware made by THAT manufacturer. (You could run the modified software on some other device that you design, or that some other manufacturer creates, if they don't require the code to be signed by them.) Tivoization is specifically disallowed by GPLv3 but is allowed by GPLv2. The FSF considers it a "loophole" in GPLv2. Linus Torvalds does not. He considers that tivoization is a choice that a hardware manufacturer is free to make, and that it has nothing to do with his intention in choosing GPLv2-which is that he simply wants the source code changes given back to him, but that you can do whatever you want with the code, including building it into a tivoized device.
I really love how absolutely hostile the asker is in this clip, and how Linus tries to explain his licensing for HIS OWN software... That gentleman is always welcome to write his own Unix-like, BSD-like Kernel, garner piles of support, bring developers together and create his own system licensed the way he pleases...
You call a respectful disagreement "absolutely hostile"? He did not demand Linus explain anything. He just respectfully asked. There is nothing wrong with disagreeing with Torvalds nor with respectfully asking him critical questions. I actually like his questions, because now Torvalds got a chance to defend his choice and make others like me understand the reasoning behind it. He did not have to defend it, but since his choice does have an influence on us it is nice of him to do so anyway and good of people to ask.
@@viheriaruikkusenpai1158 of course you cannot make a derivative of GPL software and make it proprietary (because GPL disallows it). What I mean is that, as long as you abide by the licenses of the pieces of code you're using, you can license it in whatever way you want, and FSF should stop being so bigoted about that.
Freedom zero is an important freedom. Perhaps one day in the future, all devices will run Linux as a kernel; but, the hardware will be so locked down we will only be able to use it as the vendor intends. That day is here, and it's only getting worse. Torvalds doesn't care because it doesn't effect him immediately enough for it to matter. But if you want a straight cut and a proper measurement, Torvalds, by his own admonition here, states that he is indifferent at best, and hostile at worst, to Freedom 0. That is the implication of his statements. GPLv2 has a bug, and that bug is, on specific hardware, it can't provide Freedom 0 (the freedom to run the program as you wish). And that's unfortunate... The days of ix86 are gone. Hopefully we can stay free.
Torvalds' argument is that GPLv3 changes the deal and should have been treated as a separate license track with no uplicensing, like AGPL used to be. Remember, the GPL contains a no further restrictions clause for a reason. Hell, v3 had to explicitly weaken that clause to allow compatibility with AGPL, and there's no way to disagree with that and still be in the v3 ecosystem. And yes, there are people who do not believe AGPL to be a Free license either. Notably, that set includes Hector Martin, one of the staunchest defenders of Freedom Zero I can think of. He's currently doing a bang-up job porting Linux to Apple Silicon, and his hacking history includes breaking open locked-down hardware such as the Nintendo Wii. So, yes, it's entirely reasonable to believe in the right to use software as you wish and still think stronger copylefts are a bad way to do that. My personal opinion is that there's a limit to what freedoms a copyleft can protect (hello SSPL), because there's also limits on what actions a copyright can restrict. In fact, GPLv3's TiVo clause *doesn't actually stop TiVo*, because TiVo already worked around weaker language in GPLv2 by putting the technical restrictions in their own app rather than the kernel. So you can absolutely disagree on the terms of the license without disagreeing with the goal. (Or, are you going to argue that BSD users don't care about Freedoms 1, 2, or 3?)
@@SuperSmashDolls It seems to me that the best way to go about the hardware side of things is sweeping policy. As in, the FTC telling Tivo or whoever that they cannot lock down the hardware; they must give owners the right to repair. Licenses, copyright, trademarks, etc. seem to have always been more pertinent to ideas, information, art, stories, characters, concepts, etc. and not applicable as regulatory practices for physical goods. Policy and legislation are better solutions for physical goods; the same way the law tells us we can't make or sell bombs or that Peter Pan peanut butter can't have rat feces in it should be the same way the law tells Tivo they can't keep their users from repairing their hardware. This is just a layman's perspective, I could be totally misguided here.
V2 has loopholes that should be addressed in a new license. V3 was well intended but too idealistic and neglects real world economic issues in adoption. The trick is just enough restriction to prevent the abuse and lockdown issues such as tivoization, but not so tight that you cause license compatibility issues or scare off the oldguard that still doesn't full underwrite FOSS. As such V2-style(patched up with a view to long term market strategy) is good for initial market adoption(Linux is still in this phase), V3 style is more choice once the item is the market standard. BSD/MIT/ and public domain licenses actually have the opposite issue in that they are so liberated/"free" that they can be captured and turned proprietary and the FOSS portion comes to a development stall. The prime example being Linux and BSD; the GPL allowed Linux to benefit from downstream development and compound growth while BSD is taken advantage of by the likes of Apple. The flaw in BSD licensing is that the core project can be expanded with proprietary alterations until the original BSD portion is vestigial and all the users have become dependent on the proprietary infused project, at which point the withered free bits are cut out and presto you go from FOSS to typical EULA.
This is an excellent summary. The only point you are missing is that for some people, as Linus says, all they care about is "here is something cool I made, I hope you can use it," and they don't care about getting source code back. For that purpose, BSD is perfect. You are looking at things from the view that growing the open source project must be the end goal; for that goal, yes, BSD is not great. But if you look at it with the yardstick, "Did my code get used broadly?" then the BSD code integrated into Mac OS is a great success.
@@solderbuff at least the Linux kernel modified by Android is under GPL2, as any other Linux kernel. Google itself obviously prefers BSD-type licenses as it likes to just take free stuff (and it doesn't mind giving away free stuff either, as with Chrome engine)
@@solderbuff well, everyone has their own definition of freedom, as well as the definition of justice. If I decided to opensource some of my software that was actually good, I would feel bad if other people could just take it without giving anything back. So, I would have chosen GPL2. Is giving your improvements back too much to ask?
First of all, what's the difference between hardware and software, if we think about freedom in general? And second, if I PAY for some hardware, then it means it's mine. I should have opportunity to make any changes with it and use it us I wish... It's that simple dear Linus...
If running your own OS was never advertised functionality for the device then you can't pretend you have some intrinsic right to be able to do so. I do think you're free to *try* to make the hardware do anything you want, since you paid for it and hence own it, but I don't see any legitimate reason to complain if you *can't* make it do something that the manufacturer never said it could do in the first place. Whether this is a hardware limitation or software limitation, and whether this was intentional or not, seems quite irrelevant to me. You can of course try to complain to the manufacturer and convince them to endow devices with such functionality. You can look for alternatives and vote with your money. You can try making an alternative that does what you want, or pay people to make one. Those are pretty much your options afaict.
Yes, you are free to do so. Just like manufacturers are free to use safety screws or just glue devices so you cannot open them. See non replaceable batteries on phones? You can use a saw or a drill or whatever. It's like this with software inside your hardware. You can try to change it, it is not impossible, but just made really difficult.
Well hardware is not so simple. Hardware is a product and the one that makes it is legally bound on a lot of things, if they let you change anything their life goes to hell. Law needs to change regarding a few things for that to be viable to both sides
honestly I find it funny that Linus here is having to point out that GPLv3 violates the freedom of people to use the code how they want. That's my only real issue with the FSF to be honest, they have their own definition of freedom, that makes sense at a glance, but fails at the edge cases. I think they mean well, and they do a hell of a lot of good, but they are so focused on what I can only describe as anarcho-freedom. In other words, making a society wherein it is impossible or unfathomably rare for a person to be ABLE to choose to give up freedoms. If I buy a tivo product, I have used my freedom to purchase what I wish, to give up my freedom to decide what software runs on that machine. In the goal to make sure everyone always has maximum freedom, you have to take away people's freedom to choose what freedoms they actually want. (this is especially dangerous IMO when multi-national governmental bodies attempt to give themselves the power to legislate what hardware can be on a device that was privately designed, privately engineered, privately manufactured, and privately sold to private consumers because god forbid people buy an Android to get USB-C charging.)
People are free to choose to buy tivoized products. However, that excludes them from using GPLv3 licensed software. What exactly is the benefit of tivoization to the end User for 95% of it's use cases?
@@vanessaxoax7646 obviously that's all it stops, but the point is the FSF are promoting it as if it's freedom when it's not. I don't need to prove to anyone tivoisation helps anyone, I need to prove it's people's choice whether they want to use it or not. How does chopping off your dick help people? Got nothing? Great then the government owns your dick, you don't get to choose what you do with it because you might make the wrong choice and we need to stop that from happening. The "how does this help X Y or Z people" argument relies on me giving a fuck about those people, I don't, I care about rights. Anyone imaginable can write a compelling sob story, sob stories aren't evidence nor reasoning. This is the same thing people use to try to justify the EU constantly trying to legislate Apple; I don't need to prove that the lightning port helps the end user, the reality is that users are aware of the proprietary port, and choose to buy the device anyway. The end user weighs what they want and what they don't, if they don't mind being fucked by a proprietary port or tiboization that's THEIR choice, not yours. If they don't want those things to happen, don't buy those products, it only affects you if you let it affect you. You have the right to give away your rights. You have the freedom to give away your freedom. You have the right to buy from a company that doesn't respect you. And you have the right to use software that locks you out. If you don't want to do those things that's perfectly acceptable, you CAN do many things that you shouldn't. However, just as well, if you recognize your own agency you must equally recognize others' agency if they choose something different than you.
@@robonator2945 Your both right and wrong. GPLv3's tivoisation clause does indeed restrict the devolopers freedom. However GPLv3's DRM clause *does not* restrict the developers freedom. It simply grants more. It grants the freedom to break DRM legally. TLDR; Tivoisation clause restricts developers freedom. DRM clause creates more freedom.
Soon the Hurd Kernel will be out, rest assured it will be in GPL3 for those who want it. I imagine, they strip a Linux distributions and use Hurd under the hood and their will be a split in system use among the Opensource Linux family. Those who agree with Linus will keep using Linux and those with Stallmen will go Hurd.
When you see Free Software as in Freedom software you realize that GPLv3 is a security bug fix over GPLv2, on the other hand When you see Free Software as in free beer then Linus arguments make sense.
Linus never argued that "free software" cannot be monetized (in fact, it was monetized all the way since mid-90s when the first version of RHEL was shipped). He only cares about getting the code back, while FSF people have some idealistic concepts in mind of what "free software" should look like.
What does it mean to rescinded code? Sry I'm not a native speaker and I do not have so much knowledge about this topic. Do you mean you can loose code under GPLv2 but not under GPLv3? I think Linus is saying it the other way around... He said he gives somebody code and with GPLv3 they can somehow avoid giving him changes back...
