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Problem: the letters "G, P, L" are toxic to a huge number of companies. This has nothing to do with the controversy around Stallman. It's because Microsoft spent over a billion dollars in the 1990s mis-educating the market that GPL software is "viral" and if present can "infect" non-GPL software with the GPL license.

The problem would go away if you renamed the license to something else. It's that stupid.

A lot of the flavor of the week licenses exist for this reason, as well as to address some of the weak corner cases of the AGPL.

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The GPL is neither long nor complex. If a company won’t use GPL software because of Microsoft’s efforts, but would use that software under an identical license called something else, I think that company will experience many other difficulties on their journey as well.

For shrink-wrap software, GPL can be an issue. For hosted software, it’s generally not (which is why all the desire to make other licenses, including AGPL).

> Problem: the letters "G, P, L" are toxic to a huge number of companies.

Too. Effing. Bad. These companies can either figure out how to work with FSF-authored licenses or they can go make their own alternatives. I have no sympathy for them.

Or for devs that make excuses for this attitude. They deserve to be force-pushed onto software like when Apple decided to ship zsh instead of bash because they didn't want GPLv3 in their OS. Or that whole Rails brouhaha last month.

Companies should not be trusted with permissively licensed software. You don't get to play shell games with public access.

GPL is "toxic" to the companies I work at because using GPL-licensed code would force them to disclose the source of their proprietary software.

There's not much else to it.

> Problem: the letters "G, P, L" are toxic to a huge number of companies.

Even if true, why it is problem? Company so misinformed is not going to be helpful anyway.

> A lot of the flavor of the week licenses exist for this reason, as well as to address some of the weak corner cases of the AGPL.

I'm interested in what the 'weak corner cases' of AGPL are considering it was pretty much made to correct some weaknesses in the GPL.

It doesn't adequately handle the SaaSification case, which is when someone hosts the software behind a paywall. It only handles the "Tivoization" case when someone ships the software inside a closed source box.

Isn't the purpose of GPLv3 to handle Tivoization and AGPL was made to handle server-side sort of use-cases?

If I use AGPL-licensed software in a SaaS type of environment, I still need to release the source-code even if I'm not distributing the software directly, correct?

Correct.

Are you sure? AGPL was written expressly to deal with SaaSification. Wikipedia seems to agree with me, at least[0]:

"Both versions of the Affero GPL were designed to close a perceived application service provider (ASP) loophole in the ordinary GPL, where, by using but not distributing the software, the copyleft provisions are not triggered. Each version differs from the version of the GNU GPL on which it is based in having an added provision addressing use of software over a computer network. This provision requires that the full source code be made available to any network user of the AGPL-licensed work, typically a web application."

The non-Affero GPLv3 handles Tivoization, FWIW.

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affero_General_Public_License

GPLv3 also added patent grant which is super important if you deal with software built by corporations.

It does not stop all those companies using linux. The Jeff Bezos days are over.

Curious about how the GPL is not viral... Unless you go through the hoops of making sure GPL code is sectioned (through a shared library or whatever) in your codebase, then your software becomes GPL, no? I mean sometimes you can avoid it so that the GPL project stands at an arms length to your own code but it is not always trivial. You just don't get to include the code in your project and not get "infected". The fact that you can sometimes circumvent the infection does not mean it is not viral because I believe it violates the "spirit" of the license anyways.

I think you are wrong here, if I have 2 files, first is GPL and the second is proprietary and you steal them from me and use them then what license is your code now ?

The correct answer is that your code stealing is not transforming the product into GPL or into my proprietary license. If I catch and ask for money from you you have more options with the GPL code then with my proprietary code. With the GPL code you can just GPL your code changes, maybe the entire product but you are not forced to pay me anything. With the proprietary license though you don't have the option and I can make you pay.

So if you like that much the "infectious" word, you should add an "optional" modifier , you can always not GPL your changes, remove the "stolen" code , pay damages? (not sure if this ever happened).

What I observer the issues with GPL like software is lazy developers and companies that would like to "npm install" solutions and skip doing the work.

Your software never "becomes" GPL, no matter what. That's the problem with the "viral" label, it's somewhat of a misnomer that implies that anything that comes into contact with it gets infected and suddenly all your private IP _has_ to be released and anyone can just take it an fork it.

In reality, your proprietary code can only be GPLed if you explicitly release it under that license.

What people are confusing is that it is a violation of the GPL to release binary code that links (statically or dynamically[1]) with GPL-ed code without also releasing that code under a compatible license. This is where the "viral" label comes into play, since the easiest way to link against GPL code is to just make your code GPL as well. But it _does not_ mean that if you mess up and release a binary blob with GPL code in it that you've given up all rights to the non-GPL parts.

[1] LGPL allows dynamic linking, plain GPL doesn't distinguish.

Sorry I still don't get it. Please tell me which step I am getting wrong:

I have my own proprietary code. I decide to make use of GPL code. Then I distribute the binaries. Now I have to make the source available, correct?

This source that was just made available (that includes my "proprietary code" and the GPL library I used) needs a license. At this step, I already lost my proprietary code and made it public - which might be unacceptable for some, but that in itself does not make GPL viral. Now that I need to license the released code, what options do I have? Can it be less permissive than GPL? My understanding has always been "no".

> Now I have to make the source available, correct?

Nope! That's one way to fix the licensing issue—but you're not forced to do that.

Another option would be to immediately stop distributing your binary and not distribute it again until you can replace or otherwise excise the GPL code that caused the licensing issue.

Eh, that is a bit dishonest argument. "I want to keep distributing, and I want to keep using this code" are the immutable assumptions of my argument. My point is, with those assumptions in place, there is no way to NOT propagate GPL in the entirety of the work - was my point. That is OK since GPL is intentionally made that way. Take it or leave it deal. No one is entitled to anything, if people want to distribute their work as GPL, that is up to them to decide after all. I am only discussing the virality aspect of it here as a separate fact.

And how does immediately stoping distribution help, legally? If I have already distributed the binary, the recipients are already entitled to the entire sources, no? Or does GPL have a "I have learned my lesson" clause?

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