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Comment by rahiel | Hacker News Reader

The Minix 3 license contains [0]:

    * Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright
    notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the
    documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.

So it looks like Minix's license does require the copyright/license to be included in distributions.

[0]: https://github.com/Stichting-MINIX-Research-Foundation/minix...

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The strict meaning of "Redistributions" in that clause means that Intel would have to be distributing the OS itself as a product in binary form. Deploying it in an embedded system, and selling that embedded system, particularly in a form where the user does not have access to the OS as a product, does not meet that definition. Tanenbaum himself concedes this point in this letter.

This is quite debatable, not something I'd bet a court case on.

One of my libraries with BSD 3-clause license was used in a U.S. government project. It did require particular hardware and couldn't really be deployed by any random user but they honored the mention clause without any prodding on my part.

My Bosch kitchen appliances came with a whole bunch of software licenses for embedded subsystems, even GPL ones. So it seems actual lawyers in a huge international corporation decided it constitutes distribution.

GPL3 was practically created to cover this case, as FSF lawyers didn’t feel that GPL2 is enough to enforce that. Check out the TiVoization clause in GPL3 and its history.

No it didn't. GPLv3 was created to cover the case of hardware vendors not allowing to run modified code. They still have to abide by the terms of the license even if they use GPLv2 -- that is, releasing the source code.

I thought GPLv3 was for many issues, not a single issue.

For example, the software-as-a-service loophole that GPLv3 (and AGPL) closes. We actually had an exploitation of said loophole for the open source Space Station 13 game. People were making changes to the game (each server runs their own modifications, and, the game is pure client/server so the entire 'game' is server-side binary only with dumb clients connecting) and some people were making important modifications and not sharing them with the community AND it was intentional because their mods made them the most popular server to play on (because nobody else had the features). It was a big stink, and eventually someone "leaked" the code, but then nobody could tell if that was legal to use or look at and it became a big, confusing legal grey area. All because they didn't start with AGPL or GPLv3 (or some other SaaS-aware license). The original authors probably didn't think anything of it and just thought "GPL is 'good'. So GPL it is." and that was the extent of it.

What you said is irrelevant to the discussed topic. With GPLv2, the hardware vendors must ship source code -- that is, follow the license. GPLv3 doesn't change this fact nor was it created to make this requirement, as it was already present in GPLv2, which is what we discussing.

>So it seems actual lawyers in a huge international corporation decided it constitutes distribution.

I mean, they could also just assume that shipping three sheets of paper with each washer is just cheaper than finding out.

…which still supports my point is that it's hardly trivial and clear-cut issue.

This doesn't make any sense. For the opposite opinion of many lawyers from many companies, see the list of licenses that come with multimedia systems in automobiles or in your smartphone.

Is there case law to back this up?

Aren't BIOS updates (which contain the ME code) considered binary distributions? me_cleaner woudn't work otherwise.

I suppose you could make the argument that the OEMs are the ones distributing the binaries, but they are out there.

IANAL and someone can correct me but I doubt you're right. Every IOT product I've purchased and even my car either has a printed version of open source licenses or you can access them somewhere within their GUIs.

> http://wiki.minix3.org/doku.php?id=faq&s[]=license#what_is_t...

you can read:

"What is the MINIX 3 license?

The MINIX 3 license is a clone of the Berkeley (BSD) license. In plain English, it says you can do whatever you like with the system provided that (1) you agree not to sue us under any conditions, and (2) you keep the credit lines in the source, documentation, and publicity unless other arrangements have been made. Specifically, you are free to modify the source code, redistribute it, incorporate it into commercial products with only the above restrictions."

Note the passage "unless other arrangements have been made". I am pretty sure Intel made such an agreement with the MINIX 3 developers for this reason.

this can be just a footnote in some manual coming with the cpu, which is likely the thing that actually made the information public.

So could he sue Intel for about a billion dollars now?

Also, my guess is this is part "security through obscurity", part Intel not wanting everyone to know that they used someone else's code for its chips' firmware.

IANAL, but assuming this is breaking the licence agreement, wouldn't suing for money only make legal sense if he could show that this infringement had cost him in some way?

Beyond the valid complaint of this being a personal insult, that is.

The first good faith claim to do is to notice Intel to add the copyright notice.

It's rather late now, though, considering it's been around for years now without anyone knowing exactly because they did not include that copyright notice.

I have no idea what copyright law says about damages in a case where the infringing party tries to keep their large-scale infringement secret.

The statutory damages option discussed above does not require a showing of actualy damages. It's just x dollars times the number of instances of infringement. Also, while delay in providing notice of infringement can work against the copyright owner, in this case, because Intel is a sophisticated party (i.e., big company with many in house lawyers and outside law firms advising them), the delay in making a claim would likely not help Intel's case.

It does cost him. More people would know of MINIX and more would have heard of its creator. More people would buy his books, hire him for consulting on OS design, etc.

US copyright law lets you sue for either actual damages plus the infringer's profits OR statutory damages.

https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/17/504

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