The Software Freedom Conservancy legal analysis of RHEL and GPL that OP links to is the most interesting part to me. https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2023/jun/23/rhel-gpl-analysis...
You can use others' GPL code in your products and charge money for it. You have to "publish" the GPL'ed sources (and any sources of yours that derive from GPL'ed code) on demand -- publish as in: if someone asks, you have to give it to them, but there's no requirement that there be a public download page or anything like that, and you can send the sources out in DVDs or flash drives or whatever media you like, and you can charge nominal amounts for the media. I.e., you don't have to make it easy to get the sources. And you don't have to provide the built product for free.
You can do a lot within the boundaries of the GPL. If IBM/RH does that, so what?
One can even do this sort of thing w/o GPL. For example, SQLite3 is in the public domain, yet the SQLite Consortium exists and makes what I imagine is good money for D. R. Hipp and his employees with zero competition from forks precisely because SQLite3 is very difficult to credibly fork, and SQLite3 is difficult to fork because the better test suite for it is proprietary and secret.
To a business, open source is a tool. Even for individuals, open source is a tool. A young person just starting out and with few resources might make useful software open source so as to gain notoriety and better employment, or even to start a business.
This is why we have GPL 2 and 3, for example.
Disclaimer: I work at Red Hat, but nowhere near RHEL.
From the text of the GPL itself:
> Our General Public Licenses are designed to make sure that you have the freedom to distribute copies of free software (and charge for them if you wish), that you receive source code or can get it if you want it, that you can change the software or use pieces of it in new free programs, and that you know you can do these things.
RedHat is trying to sell software that is licensed under the GPL -- which has to be, because the base of it was written by others and the only reason RedHat is even allowed to use it or sell it is under the GPL -- and try to prevent users from having the freedom to re-distribute the GPL software they received, with or without their own modifications.
They are trying to subvert the GPL. They know they are. That's why they have all this language where they say they aren't intending to limit your rights under the GPL -- it's just that they'll refuse to have you as a customer if you exersize them, that's all.
Whether it is legal or not is a question for laywers. If it's legal, and it succesfully prevents users from redistributing GPL RedHat, then it's an accidental loophole, and has subverted the GPL's intent and design, as stated in the GPL itslef.
> refuse to have you as a customer if you exersize them, that's all.
refuse to -continue- to have you as a customer, that is. you are still perfectly entitled to the source code of, and distribution thereof, what you purchased.
The GPL doesn't create an obligation that you get continued access to future updates.
I probably should leave the conversation at this point (not because I don't think there's merit in discussing it with you - just don't want to muddy the waters).
> ... to make sure that you have the freedom to distribute copies of free software (and charge for them if you wish), that you receive source code or can get it if you want it, that you can change the software or use pieces of it in new free programs, and that you know you can do these things.
when i'm not allowed to be your customer anymore i don't have "the freedom to distribute copies". you're putting a limitation on me - that's not freedom. or specifically, regarding "that you receive source code or can get it if you want it": i can't get it if i want it when you're refusing me as a customer.
or citing https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html: > If you commercially distribute binaries not accompanied with source code, the GPL says you must provide a written offer to distribute the source code later. When users non-commercially redistribute the binaries they received from you, they must pass along a copy of this written offer. This means that people who did not get the binaries directly from you can still receive copies of the source code, along with the written offer.
> The reason we require the offer to be valid for any third party is so that people who receive the binaries indirectly in that way can order the source code from you.
so: there is explicitly no limitation allowed on the receiving of the source code. Red Hat is putting a limitation on it.
so for me it's clear that Red Hat is in violation of GPL, at least how the GPL was meant. maybe it's not legally waterproof because it's not formulated in a way that's withstanding a legal case against Red Hat but still: it's meant that way. and i hope and pray that in such a case the GPL (and every other license in use) is updated specifically against that (mis)use case so that Red Hat can't do such abominations.
I recognized that as a risk, hence the disengagement, for sure. I also know that not just in matters like this, I am overly prone to analyzing and lawyering things, perhaps to too great a degree.
> when i'm not allowed to be your customer anymore i don't have "the freedom to distribute copies". you're putting a limitation on me - that's not freedom. or specifically, regarding "that you receive source code or can get it if you want it": i can't get it if i want it when you're refusing me as a customer.
I will say I absolutely get this perspective here and how it applies to the "spirit" of the GPL, and the way you phrase it is good in recognizing things as disparate but also intrinsically intertwined.
I will also say (on a personal level, I of course don't speak for RH) I think any such things should be addressed at the root, i.e. in the GPL.
Yes, but there's no time machines allowing time travel into the past.
So this is very interesting. Say I want a copy of source code for X and you tell me you have it, but you're not an authoritative source of source code for X: how can I trust your copy, if I choose to get it from you?
Redistribution of sources is a nice right to have, but most people prefer to get them from authoritative sources as long as they're available. As long as IBM makes these sources available for a nominal fee, they're within the GPL, and people who want them should just go through that process.
> so: there is explicitly no limitation allowed on the receiving of the source code. Red Hat is putting a limitation on it.
IBM can't legally not provide a copy of the sources for a nominal fee. And they can't limit what you do with them as far as licensing goes, but it may well be that legally speaking they can terminate rights not under the GPL. Maybe this is just a loophole in the GPL. Maybe the courts will accept it, maybe not.
But that the GPL lets you take GPL software, add your own features on top, sell it, and tell customers that if they redistribute it themselves (as the GPL explicitly allows), you will refuse to sell them software in the future ever again? Nope nope nope. I think it's not entirely clear if the GPL allows that or not, but if it does, it seems pretty clear to me that it's inadvertant, and not what the GPL was intended to do.
At any rate, this is a different thing, and to me another level of shadiness, than simply pointing out that the GPL does not require an entity to distribute the source via public download links -- this is about the entity trying to prohibit users from re-distributing the source themselves, and the GPL really was intentionally designed to try and avoid such prohibitions, that's kind of it's whole reason for existing.
Does "Nope nope nope" answer the first question with "no", but then the "I think it's not entirely clear if the GPL allows that or not" answer it with "maybe"? Or was the "nope" think just a wish? I believe the GPL is silent on that. You might be right that this would be an inadvertent loophole, but as you know, it's not trivial to fix this sort of problem.
the GPL, by it's own text explaining itself, is intended to ensure that users of GPL software always have the right to re-distribute it. It says that right in it.
If your point is that IBM has enough lawyers and money to prevent users from redistributing GPL software, and they may have figured out how to exersize a loophole that will be difficult to do anything about it, especially cause of all those lawyers and money... right, indeed, sure.
If you are suggesting that we should all consider this just fine, and you don't care what the GPL intended to do, and you don't think anyone else should either, and we should all aspire to make money by getting away with subverting the GPL... okay, thanks for sharing? But as for me: nope nope nope.
It's not. The that IBM has here is that they're doing is not lawyers and money, it's that their customers depend on them -- vendor lock-in if you wish.
> If you are suggesting that we should all consider this just fine, and you don't care what the GPL intended to do, and you don't think anyone else should either, and we should all aspire to make money by getting away with subverting the GPL... okay, thanks for sharing? But as for me: nope nope nope.
I'm suggesting something else entirely. First, that if IBM is legally right but you/we/they don't like it, there's voting with wallets, or sucking it up if you're stuck with IBM. Second, I'm suggesting that open source is a business tool for everyone from a poor individual to a multi-billion company -- a tool rather than an end in itself.
Now, I agree that open source as an end is fun ("look ma', what code I wrote!"), but people still need to put food on the table. Just like fine art, where artists want total freedom of expression, but often produce the kinds of art that will sell well because... it's nice to not be dependent on charity. Even back in the days when artists had patrons, they still had to appeal to the patrons' tastes, and if they wanted to revolutionize art they had to convince the patrons that that was a good thing.
Which is possible.
Where we disagree is that you are trying to summarize them all as the same thing -- either you are doing something that violates the license in a way that can be enforced in court, or it's all just the same category of doing what the license allows as a tool while putting food on the table.
The difference, I am suggesting, within that category, is simply that the GPL was very specifically designed to allow users of GPL software to redistribute that software without restriction, and Red Hat is trying to prevent this, while using GPL'd software.
It's as simple as that. This makes it different than just any generic "I'm within the letter of the license while trying to maximize the profit I can make from using this open source".
Whether it is within the license or not is not clear, only a court can decide.
Whether it violates the intent of the GPL is pretty clear, it says so right in the GPL.
Of course, nobody has to care about the intent of the GPL, but you don't have to consider open source an "end and not a tool" to care about the intent of the GPL. The choice is not just "I think open source is a political movement rather than tool", vs "I am fine with companies using GPL software to do things the GPL's whole reason for existing is to prevent, if that's what they need to do to maximize their profit, cause we're all just maximizing our profit here, whatever you can get away with is fine."
Open source is a tool, and GPL open source is a tool that preserves the right to modify and/or redistribute it, which is why some people choose to use it or license under it. I do understand that those rights are of no concern to you, right.
IBM has no problem putting food on its table. It's doing so by using open source products to accomplish it.
On the other hand, IBM is trying to prevents others from putting food on their tables, using the same open source products.
IBM is painting themselves as the victim here[1]. You and many others have taken the bait.
[1] https://www.redhat.com/en/blog/red-hats-commitment-open-sour...
Selling binaries has always been a business model.
Trying to prevent people from redistributing the source: no.
(Yes, in an internet world, it's hard to make money selling binaries if people can redistribute source, maybe. the FSF was selling binaries in a different context, for better or worse. You are still welcome to sell binaries. You are even welcome to charge for distribution of source. But the fundamental goal of the GPL is to give users the right to redistribute source without restriction. The FSF never tried to limit that.)