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Comment by vmception | Hacker News Reader

Ok I’m missing a key part of this: Why should I care about this recurring drama? Is the leadership of the FSF even important? I’ve gone my whole life without needing to follow board composition of the FSF.

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A principled head of the FSF is bad for corporate profit margins but good for anybody else who participates in the free software ecosystem.

There are quite a lot of powerful people who would like to see it water down its principles. Thats a lot easier without Stallman.

I don't for a second believe that this is actually about what RMS said. This scandal has corporate PR fingerprints all over it.

I was wondering who would have this vendetta to elevate RMS' various comments as so insensitive compared to what other people do or say

They just seem so innocuous, unrelated to leadership, and with FSF being too obscure of an organization to even bother. Even the generalized argument in favor of dismantling perceived oppressive systems by ostracizing all the leaders just seems so misplaced here.

Thanks for a perspective on who and why.

A reason: Lots of software is licensed under "GPL V2, or newer" or "GPL v3, or newer"

The Free Software Foundation can release a new version of that license, which will relicense all those works under those new terms.

As I read it, users will still have the option to choose the existing concrete license (ignoring “or later”), so if V4 became a restrictive license somehow, “V2 or later” is no more restrictive for users who don’t want it to be.

I think the worry is that a V4 could be less restrictive. Imagine the FSF gets bought out and releases a GPLv4 that's essentially the MIT license. All existing "GPLvX or later" software like the Linux kernel could then be extended without releasing the source code.

Linux is mostly GPLv2-only. Parts of it are under MIT, BSD, or even GPLv2-or-later, but the whole work is GPLv2-only.

I wish you were correct. Hypothetically there could be a new version of the GPL that is crafted without any CDDL incompatibilities and we'd finally get to import ZFS into Linux, but alas, even if a GPLv4 came around to do that, Linux wouldn't benefit.

The Linux Kernel is GPLv2 without the "or later" clause.

Starting from v3 no, thats why many projects are still on GPL v2

Could you expand on that?

Suppose there’s a library “foo” licensed under GPL v3 or later.

GPLv4 comes out and has a term I don’t like (maybe it says “may not be used by anyone with more than 2 ‘o’s in their name”). Am I not free to use foo under the v3 terms, ignoring “or later”?

From the v3 license: Each version is given a distinguishing version number. If the Program specifies that a certain numbered version of the GNU General Public License “or any later version” applies to it, you have the option of following the terms and conditions either of that numbered version or of any later version published by the Free Software Foundation. If the Program does not specify a version number of the GNU General Public License, you may choose any version ever published by the Free Software Foundation.

You continue to be able to use it under GPLv3 terms, but if you distribute it (and don't hold the full copyright) you must distribute it in a "or newer" compatible way.

Interesting. I’m not sure if I don’t understand or if I disagree.

Let’s imagine it’s 2005, I’m TiVo, and the Linux kernel was licensed under “v2 or later”* and GPL v2 is the latest version of the license that exists.

I ship a product using the Linux kernel complying with the GPLv2. FSF dislikes what I’ve done and releases a v3 license in 2006. I claim that in 2007, I’m still allowed to ship my product, by electing to “follow the terms and conditions” of the v2 version of the license and only if Linux relicenses itself as “v3 or later” could I not ship such later licensed versions but I could keep shipping my product as-was with a “v2 or later” kernel, even though my product is compliant with the v2 distribution terms but not with the v3 terms.

Q1. Do you see it differently?

Further, someone else could start a ViTo company in 2008 and ship a same conditions product without violating the GPL “v2 or later” (that there isn’t anything special about TiVo doing it before v3 was released). Q2. Does that change anything?

* - I know Linux kernel is “v2 exactly”, but this was the simplest readily understandable example I could think of, so let’s use that incorrect hypothetical here.

I would say it's complicated. The scenario in my head is like this: I take "GPL3 or newer" software and build my derived software on top and distribute that without thinking about the "or newer clause" now G pLv4 comes along, my user has the "GPLv3 or newer" component and uses GPLv4 with it, which might have requirements impacting my software ... or not ... I don't know.

All I can say: that "or newer" exists and a misguided FSF can cause trouble (see also outcry with GPLv3, where people removed the or newer clause for those reasons)

GPL v3 have "or later" in it's body. So any GPLv3 licensed code automatically licensed under GPLv4 once it would be available.

I believe that the text "you have the option of following the terms and conditions either of that numbered version or of any later version" means that it is still available to be used under the terms and conditions of GPLv3 or GPLv4 at the option of the person using the code (such that if v4 prohibited use by people with 3 o's in their name, I could still use foo under the v3 terms).

Do you claim that once v4 is published I cannot use code licensed as "v3 or later" by complying with the v3 terms and conditions? That seems to me to directly contradict the language in the license. I agree that "v3 or later" code automatically is available for use under v4 terms once v4 is published, but it also remains available under v3 terms.

What if it became less restrictive?

Fair! Many contributors would likely relicense under a fixed version, so old code that was licensed “or later” is permanently leaked under the license they now find too permissive, but code that’s not maintained has significantly less value.

Following on from that, what does the FSF even do now other than making cringe infographics and some weird animated series about proprietary software being supervillains?

Having a party on your “side” of an opinion spectrum that is very extreme — like the FSF under Stallman - is important for maintaining the Overton window of acceptability where you want it. If you want the minimum wage raised to $10, Bernie Sanders arguing for $15, and bringing people into that worldview, helps you. Such has been the FSF for open source especially in its nascent days with corporate interests still thinking they could kill it.

Great comment - the extremes of the overton window determine what is acceptable as the middle. And the middle is crucial, as we are, as people, almost always framing issues as having two sides, and compromising to something in that middle.

Without one of those extremes including your own position or including it and being further left/right, no compromise will ever happen that includes what you want.

so from what I can tell, people tried node-based "cancelling" where they try to ostracize people and organizations associated with the target person, and it failed and this is the tail-end of that saga

the FSF folded in the past, and has since called the weakness of this vendetta and particular approach, and it would be redundant to even rehash the particular comments Stallman has said or evaluate his leadership

people have tried tying morality to prosperity, and there is no reality where that is related

okay, anyway

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