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Comment by steve1977 | Hacker News Reader

steve1977

> GPL doesn't set a standard time limit for providing the sources, but that doesn't mean they can delay it indefinitely.

I wonder actually what a court would say here and if "doesn't set a time limit" could mean "the source needs to be made available immediately". IANAL.

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A reasonable interpretation would be that they had a previous process that eliminated delivery latency and required no manual manpower for responding, so changing it has been done to induce artificial friction, against the intent of the license.

Not that the intent of a license can be enforced.

Compliance with the intent of the law is one of the things courts get to decide on.

Someone just needs to be crazy enough to sue (and rich/lucky enough to win)

Just need a lawyer looking for an interesting class action, to be honest. All gOS users can be in the class.

I don't think gOS users are actually the damaged party. I imagine it would be non-google copyright holders of gOS code.

Are they not damaged by delayed updates including security patches?

> Not that the intent of a license can be enforced.

Why can't it? A license is not just a piece of text but a meeting of minds.

Which licenses specify which time limit for disclosure of open source code (which is contributed to by many stakeholders)?

That's why I said intent rather than letter. That said if we allow for arbitrary lengths of time, one could argue that sending back a reply indicating that the source will be delivered in 50-75 years is equally compliant.

But such would not be a reasonable amount of time or in the spirit of the agreed-upon policy.

In the US? Under the current political and economic circumstances? Against Google's legal department? I wouldn't get my hopes up...

No, it would be in Canada.

And any other country where Android OS is used by vendors. Even so, in the US as a class action from every major vendor would probably do it.

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