That being said, and please correct me if this doesn't exist in the US/US-CA, have they risked a malicious intent argument here? Did they go out and buy the TV with the sole intent of baiting Visio into an argument?
If you redistribute GPLed binaries you have to be willing to provide the source that built that binary, whether it incorporated changes or not, to anyone who asks. “Provide” can include pointing someone at a public repo these days.
https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-3.0.html#license-text, article 6a:
“a) Convey the object code in, or embodied in, a physical product (including a physical distribution medium), accompanied by the Corresponding Source fixed on a durable physical medium customarily used for software interchange.”
Assuming any “durable physical medium customarily used for software interchange” still exists, that means that, if you choose to ship your software on CD you have to give the source to whomever you distribute the binary, but need not make the source code available to others.
If, instead, you go for the distribution method of article 6b, you do have to make the source code available to anyone who possesses the object code, but not indefinitely:
“b) Convey the object code in, or embodied in, a physical product (including a physical distribution medium), accompanied by a written offer, valid for at least three years and valid for as long as you offer spare parts or customer support for that product model, to give anyone who possesses the object code either (1) a copy of the Corresponding Source for all the software in the product that is covered by this License, on a durable physical medium customarily used for software interchange, for a price no more than your reasonable cost of physically performing this conveying of source, or (2) access to copy the Corresponding Source from a network server at no charge.”
So, if you distribute the binary in a “physical distribution medium”, and then immediately claim to stop supporting that product, I think you’re off the hook if nobody asks for the source code for 3 years.
Also, should that “(including a physical distribution medium)” have been there in that article in the license? It means you can sell a CD with your software, immediately stop supporting that CD, and get of the hook in 3years time.
These days you can just post a link to a github repo on your web site
Which they can resolve by asking you for it, so not much of a loophole.
It would seem that this makes buying the tv just for the sake of the case perfectly fine by at least 2 different vectors, each of which would seem to be enough all by itself. 1 - You have to be able to test something to prove you have it. 2 - The overwhelmingly unambiguous writing in the gpl itself, let alone all the other surrounding decades of writings and speaking by both the people who wrote it, and the people who chose to apply it to their own works.
Maybe yet a 3rd factor, the SFC probably isn't trying to get paid money besides maybe the cost of the trial itself and some token, all they really want is for Vizio to do what they are already supposed to do. No matter why the SFC buys a tv, Vizio still has no excuse for not doing it's part, and all the SFC wants is for Vizio to have done what it should have, and it's not even something which costs Vizio anything. If they try to argue that SFC can't show they were actually harmed, neither can Vizio show that SFC is merely seeking to harm them.
My very biased (I want it to mean this) view anyway.
In law, standing or locus standi is a condition that a party seeking a legal remedy must show they have, by demonstrating to the court, sufficient connection to and harm from the law or action challenged to support that party's participation in the case.
I suspect that is the reason. So it is not 'bad', it is just necessary in order to sue