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Comment by jarym | Hacker News Reader

Hey, I absolutely love Graal and where it is going. Big problem for me has been the license: GPLv2+CPE. On its own this is not a problem but coming from Oracle it makes people nervous.

I think if there's ever room to move towards Apache 2 or similar license it would be really welcome.

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There's no reason to think that you're safe even if it were Apache-licensed. One of the things that was made clear in Oracle v. Google is that Oracle effectively treats litigation as an essential expense for exploring all revenue sources, leaving others susceptible to suits whether they have merit or not. Compounding this latter concern was that another thing made clear is that the terms of the respective licenses is something that Oracle doesn't consider important. Refer to McNealy testifying for example that commercial use of even GPL-licensed work is prohibited (despite the terms of the license not supporting this stance).

And there is no reason the spread FUD.

Oracle v. Google has nothing to do with it (Java’s licence at the time explicitly disallowed mobile usage) Do you have an examples that give rise to any sort of concern about the usage of GPL-licenced code (regardless of code owner)?

It's like we're not even having the same conversation. McNealy, founder of Sun, testified under oath that GPL doesn't permit commercial use. What was unclear about this the first time it was stated?

> GPL doesn't permit commercial use

That is alarmingly false. Do you have a source that McNealy indeed has said that? I couldn't find anything by googling.

Scott McNealy, under direct examination on 2012 April 26: "you can't license GPL code and then resell it for a profit"

Source: Official Reporters for the US District Court for the Northern District of California (regarding Oracle v. Google, 3:10-cv-03561)

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