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<head>
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<title>GPLv3 - Transcript of Richard Stallman from the second
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international GPLv3 conference, Porto Alegre, Brazil;
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2006-04-21</title>
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</head>
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<body>
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<h1>Transcript of Richard Stallman at the 2nd international GPLv3
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conference ; 21st April 2006</h1>
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<p>
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See our <a href="gplv3.html">GPLv3 project</a> page for information
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on <a href="gplv3#participate">how to participate</a>. And you may
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be interested in
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our <a href="http://wiki.fsfe.org/Transcripts#licences">list of
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transcripts on GPLv3 and free software licences</a>.
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</p>
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<p>The following is a transcript of Richard Stallman's presentation
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made at the second international GPLv3 conference, held in Porto
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Alegre in conjunction with the International Free Software Forum
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(FISL). Good quality videos of the entire conference should become
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available online in the future. This transcript was made from a low
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quality recording made with a digital camera. There are some gaps
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due to hardware limitations.
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</p>
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<p>Transcription of this event was undertaken
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by Ciaran O'Riordan.
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Please support work such as this by
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joining <a href="http://fellowship.fsfe.org/">the Fellowship of FSFE</a>,
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and by encouraging others to do so.</p>
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<p>Richard Stallman launched
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the <a href="/documents/gnuproject.html">GNU project</a> in 1983,
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and with it the <a href="/documents/freesoftware.html">Free
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Software</a> movement. Stallman is the president of FSF - a sister
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organisation of FSFE.</p>
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<p>The speech was made in English.</p>
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<h2>Presentation sections</h2>
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<ol>
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<li><a href="#begin">The presentation</a></li>
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<li><a href="#what-is-gpl">What is the GNU GPL and Free Software?</a></li>
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<li><a href="#what-is-copyleft">What is copyleft?</a></li>
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<li><a href="#before-gnu-gpl">Pre-history: before the GNU GPL</a></li>
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<li><a href="#liberty-or-death">The "Liberty or Death" clause, the main change from v1 to v2</a></li>
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<li><a href="#why-change-it">Why change it? It was always in the plan, hence "or any later version"</a></li>
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<li><a href="#tivoisation">First main change: malicious DRM part 1, preventing tivoisation</a></li>
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<li><a href="#circumvention-not-prohibited">Malicious DRM part 2, grant of permission to access generated data</a></li>
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<li><a href="#software-patents-grant">Second main change: software patents part 1, explicit patent grant</a></li>
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<li><a href="#software-patents-retaliation">Software patents part 2, narrow retaliation</a></li>
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<li><a href="#licence-compatibility">Third main change: licence compatibility</a></li>
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<li><a href="#limits-of-requirements">How the addable requirements are limited</a></li>
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</ol>
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<h2>Questions and Answers session sections</h2>
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<ul>
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<li><a href="#q10-gfdl">Is GPLv3 good for documentation (about GFDL)?</a></li>
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<li><a href="#q20-affero">Why not put the Affero clause for web services into the licence?</a></li>
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<li><a href="#q30-cooperating-with-osi">About cooperating with OSI / ESR</a></li>
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<li><a href="#q40-creative-commons">Creative Commons is not one licence</a></li>
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<li><a href="#q50-osi-responds">Michael Tiemann of OSI comments on RMS's work</a></li>
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<li><a href="#q60-translations">Will there be official translations of GPLv3</a></li>
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<li><a href="#q70-fragments">Fragments of a tivoisation question before the camera dies</a></li>
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</ul>
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<ul>
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<li><a href="#links">Links to documents for more information on the
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topics covered</a></li>
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</ul>
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<h2 id="begin">The presentation</h2>
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<p>
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[Richard starts by noting bad news that he has heard the Brazillian
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patent office is now accepting software patents and says that this is
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the most important thing for Latin American Free Software supporters
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to work on in the coming months.]
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</p>
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<p class="indent">
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Richard Stallman: So now I will turn to the subject I was supposed to
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speak about, which is somewhat related: the GNU General Public
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License, or the GNU GPL for short.
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</p>
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<p id="what-is-gpl">[section: What is the GNU GPL and Free Software?]</p>
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<p class="indent">
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First of all: what is the GNU General Public License?
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</p>
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<p class="indent">
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The GNU General Public License is a Free Software licence, that means
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a licence which is designed to give you four essential freedoms - the
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four freedoms that define Free Software.
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</p>
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<p class="indent">
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A program is Free Software if you, the user, have these four freedoms:
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</p>
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<ul>
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<li class="indent">
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Freedom zero is the freedom to run the program as you wish, for any
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purpose.
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</li>
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<li class="indent">
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Freedom one is the freedom to study the source code and change it to
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make it do what you wish.
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</li>
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<li class="indent">
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Freedom two is the freedom to help your neighbour, that's the freedom
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to make copies and distribute them to others when you wish.
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</li>
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<li class="indent">
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Freedom three is the freedom to help your community: the freedom to
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publish or distribute modified versions when you wish.
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</li>
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</ul>
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<p class="indent">
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With these four freedoms, the program is Free Software because it is
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distributed in an ethical fashion and respects the user's individual
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freedom and respects the social solidarity of their community.
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</p>
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<p class="indent">
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If you one of these freedoms is missing, that means the program is
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distributed in an anti-social way that tramples the user's freedom,
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that attacks social solidarity, in a way that keeps the users divided
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and helpless, in a way that should never be done. So, any licence
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that grants the user these four freedoms is a Free Software licence.
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</p>
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<p class="indent">
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There are many Free Software licences - too many perhaps - it's
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somewhat inconvenient when there are so many but the fact is that
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anyone can write a license that grants these four freedoms, and that
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is a Free Software licence. If it does grant these four freedoms, it
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is a Free Software licence.
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</p>
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<p class="indent">
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The GNU General Public License was among the first Free Software
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licences. I do know of one that existed before and that is the
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licence of TeX, but the GNU General Public License was designed
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specifically to be a Free Software licence.
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</p>
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<p id="what-is-copyleft">[section: What is copyleft?]</p>
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<p class="indent">
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There are two broad categories of Free Software licences. Those that
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are copyleft and those that are not.
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</p>
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<p class="indent">
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Copyleft means that the licence actively defends the freedom of all
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users and what this means is: we don't just stop with giving you these
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four freedoms but we ensure that every user that gets a copy of the
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program gets the same four freedoms in the same way.
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</p>
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<p class="indent">
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This is the idea of copyleft. A non-copyleft licence grants the four
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freedoms but it allows creating modified versions which are not free
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at all which means that by the time the program gets to you, it might
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have passed through some intermediary who has taken away the freedom,
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so you might get the code without the freedom. Whereas a copyleft
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licence says that when intermediaries pass the code along to you, they
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must give you the same freedom they got from us. So you must get the
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freedom. All users must get the freedom. That is the basic idea of
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copyleft.
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</p>
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<p class="indent">
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So the GNU General Public License says: you are permitted to modify
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this program, you are permitted to copy this program, you are
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permitted to distribute those copies, you are permitted to distribute
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modified versions. But there's a condition: whatever version you
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distribute, must be under this licence, and it must be available as
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source code. That means that people who get it from you will get the
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same freedom that you got, so all the users get those freedoms.
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</p>
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<p id="before-gnu-gpl">[section: Pre-history: before the GNU GPL]</p>
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<p class="indent">
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The first General Public Licenses that I worked on in the 1980s were
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for individual GNU programs. For instances, GNU Emacs had the GNU
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Emacs General Public License, but then I realised that there was a
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problem. Different GNU packages had licences which were just slightly
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different because each licence had to state the name of the program
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that covers it. So GNU Emacs had the GNU Emacs General Public License
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and GCC had the GCC General Public License and they were the same
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except that one says that it is the GNU Emacs General Public License
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and the other said it was the GCC General Public License, which meant
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that they were not actually the same, they were just isomorphic.
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</p>
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<p>
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[laughter]
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</p>
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<p class="indent">
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And this was a practical problem. I realised that it would be much
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more convenient if the licences were identical in all programs, so I
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worked on this some more and I arranged that the licence did not need
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to have the name of the program in it anymore. So the licence for
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Emacs could be word for word identical to the licence in GCC.
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</p>
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<p class="indent">
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So the GNU General Public License version 1 was published in 1989 as a
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Free Software copyleft licence that you could drop into your program
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in order to release your program under that licence.
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</p>
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<p id="liberty-or-death">[section: The "Liberty or Death" clause, the main change from v1 to v2]</p>
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<p class="indent">
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Some fairly small changes were made to produce version 2 in 1991. I
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think the biggest change in version 2 was to introduce a "Liberty or
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Death" clause - the clause that says if somebody uses a patent or
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something else to effectively make a program non-free then it cannot
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be distributed at all. And the reason is this clause is extremely
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important. You see, there is nothing we can do to take away the legal
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problem of software patents. If somebody has a patent that covers a
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free program, he can stop that program from being distributed. He can
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sue everybody who distributes it if he wants to actually pay lawyers to
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do that.
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</p>
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<p class="indent">
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We can't prevent that by what we put in the licence for the program
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itself, but we can prevent something that's even worse. A fate that's
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worse than death for the program and that is suppose the patent holder
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says to every distributor "I'll sue you unless you take out a licence
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and pay me" and thus in effect, people will have to get permission and
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pay for permission to distribute the program, it would not be a free
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program anymore.
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</p>
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<p class="indent">
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We can't write our licence to make software patents go away, but we
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can write our licence so that they can kill the program but they can't
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enslave it.
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</p>
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<p class="indent">
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This makes a difference because if they thought that by suing, they
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could make everybody pay them, it would be extremely attractive,
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extremely tempting to do that. And so we would be seeing lots of free
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programs that had been made effectively be proprietary, whose licences
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have become fiction because you wouldn't really have the freedoms that
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they say you have.
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</p>
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<p class="indent">
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To kill the program is less attractive because that doesn't bring you
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money - at least not directly. So by saying "You can kill this
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program but you can't enslave it's users", to some extent we have
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protected ourselves from either one because only if somebody is acting
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from malice, from an attempt to just cause trouble for us, does he
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gain.
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</p>
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<p class="indent">
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Of course, there are some companies that do have patents that might
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want to attack us just for the sake of making us fail and one of them
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has obtained substantial presence here and asks for our cooperation,
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but at least this clause - the "Liberty of Death" clause - does some
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good. That was the main change in version 2 in 1991.
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</p>
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<p class="indent">
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Back then, 1991, it was mostly parts of the GNU system, GNU packages,
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that used the GNU General Public License, but during the 1990s many
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other people started writing Free Software and releasing their
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programs under the GNU GPL. It was designed so that this would be
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easy to do, I hoped people would do this, and in the 1990s they
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started. So, the result is that the GNU GPL is now the principal free
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software licence, used for about 70% of Free Software packages.
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</p>
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<p id="why-change-it">[section: Why change it? It was always in the
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plan, hence "or any later version"]</p>
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<p class="indent">
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So why are we changing it? Well, from the very beginning, I figured
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that we would be changing it some day. Things change, new problems
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always develop, laws are changing, and so I realised that we would
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have to change this licence some day. And, I also figured that this
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would apply to many programs written by lots of different people, so I
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suggested to people: please release your programs saying "GNU GPL
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version 1 or greater", saying this program may be used under version 1
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of the GNU GPL or any later versions, and this way, when version 2 came
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out, those programs would automatically be usable under version 2 and
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then since version two, we've been releasing programs saying "this can
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be used under version 2 or any later version" so that in the future,
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when GPL version 3 is finalised and is ready for use and officially
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published, all those programs would be available under version 3 as
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well, and this way, all these programs will make a smooth transition
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to GPL version 3.
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</p>
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<p class="indent">
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Ok, it's not surprising that there would be a change someday, but why
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specifically are we changing it now? And what are the changes?
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</p>
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<p class="indent">
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Well, first of all, there is no one big change. There is no one
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reason for these changes, each change has it's own little reason. The
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basic idea is the same: make sure all the users get these four
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freedoms. All the changes are in details. Many of the changes are
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clarifications - they're not intended to change the meaning at all,
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just make it clearer to everybody that the meaning is what it is.
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</p>
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<p class="indent">
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Some changes are meant to make the GPL more independent of variations
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between countries and their laws for software. Although copyright is
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pretty much the same thing in all countries, some details vary, so now
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we know more, and we're in a position to ask more people for advice
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about what the differences are between particular countries' laws.
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</p>
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<p class="indent">
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We've designed the new language to insulate itself from the changes so
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that regardless of these changes, the meaning of the GPL is the same.
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</p>
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<p class="indent">
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Well, that's going to be very non-controversial, I'm sure. But there
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are some changes that really are meant to be substantive changes.
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There are three main areas for this. One is to do with Tivoisation,
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another has to do with software patents, and another has to do with
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compatibility with other Free Software licences.
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</p>
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<p id="tivoisation">[section: First main change: malicious DRM part 1, preventing tivoisation]</p>
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<p class="indent">
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First: Tivoisation. That's a word I made up. It's named after a
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product called the TiVo, which is the first example - or at least the
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first I remember - of a certain specific threat to our freedom. The
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Tivo contains a GNU+Linux operating system - a fairly small one, but
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that's what it is. And this means it contains programs released under
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the GNU GPL, and as far as I know they're not violating the GNU GPL,
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so I'm presuming that the users can get the source code, that they
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make it available in one of the appropriate ways. So the users can
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get the source code, they can edit it, they can compile their modified
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versoins, they can install them in the Tivo, and then they won't run.
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</p>
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<p class="indent">
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You see, the Tivo is designed so that it won't run your changed
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versions, it refuses to even start and thus, nominally, Freedom number
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1, the freedom to change the source code so that it will do what you
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want, nominally the users have that freedom but really the user does
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not have that freedom. You can change the source code so that it
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would do what you want, but then it won't do anything.
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</p>
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<p>
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[laughter]
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</p>
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<p class="indent">
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So this is called Tivoisation and this is what we're trying to
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prevent. But why are we so concerned with this? Well, why would
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anybody do Tivoisation? What is the motive? The reason is because
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they're putting malicious features into the code and they don't want
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the users to fix these deliberate problems. The Tivo has two kinds of
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nasty features.
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</p>
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<p class="indent">
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One is that it spies on the user - it reports what the user watches.
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And second, it doesn't allow the user to copy any of the TV programs
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out of the Tivo. So this is a form of Digital Restrictions
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Management. Now, they're goal is to restrict the users and deny the
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users freedom. So, when the users are getting Free Software, the
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users can really exercise Freedom 1 and change the software so as to
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get around the restrictions, but that would defeat the whole scheme to
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restrict you. So, they tivoise the software to stop you effectively
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changing the software and that way you can't escape from the
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restrictions. In general, tivoisation is done by someone who wants to
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impose nasty features, malicious features, on another.
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</p>
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<p class="indent">
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Now, I disagree with those features, I think they're unethical. Well,
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as long as people continue to have the full, the real enjoyment of
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Freedom number 1, I don't need to worry about those malicious features
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because people will take them out, they will fix them, but once the
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software is tivoised, the users can't fix it.
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</p>
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<p class="indent">
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So GPL version 3 was designed to prohibit tivoisation. It does not
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prohibit the malicious features of the code. It does not prohibit
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changing the software to report what the user does. It does not
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prohibit changing the software so that it refuses to copy things or so
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that it doesn't have a feature to copy things at all, but it does
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prohibit stopping the user from making other modifications.
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</p>
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<p class="indent">
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The way it does this is something we had to work on, we had to really
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think about how to achieve this. It actually doesn't do this by
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prohibiting any mode of distribution. They can design the hardware to
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that it requires the binaries to be signed by a certain signature key
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in order to run, but they must give you the signature key so that you
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can sign your modified binaries. They must give you whatever it takes
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to authorise your version so that it will run. So, that is the main
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anti-Digital-Restrictions-Management provision of GPL version three
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and it actually doesn't talk about Digital Restrictions Management, it
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just prohibits tivoisation, so yes, you I can put Digital Restrictions
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Management in the software and provide it to you, but you can take out
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the DRM.
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</p>
|
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<p class="indent">
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Well, that's not the only thing we do to prevent DRM, there are a few
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other things. We're actually preventing DRM from being imposed on you
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such that you can't actually change the software to take it out.
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</p>
|
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|
|
<p id="circumvention-not-prohibited">[section: Malicious DRM part 2,
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grant of permission to access generated data]</p>
|
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<p class="indent">
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One is, when a GPL covered program is used to produce encrypted data,
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then, the GPL says that they have given you permission to write your
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own software to read that data because some countries have a very
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nasty law - of course, you can guess which country was the first - a
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law that actually prohibits software that enables people to bypass the
|
|
restrictions of DRM. If somebody had released a work that is designed
|
|
for digital restrictions, and somebody else releases a program that
|
|
can access the work without restrictions, that second program is
|
|
illegal - in my country, and in Europe, and about fifty countries
|
|
who've signed a treaty whose sole purpose is to restrict their own
|
|
citizens.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
So, GPL says if the first program, the one that makes these works
|
|
restricted with DRM is GPL-covered, then that gives everybody
|
|
permission to release other GPL-covered programs to read the same
|
|
works. In other words, they cannot take advantage of those laws to
|
|
forbid the other programs.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
Once again, we're not prohibiting people from changing the software to
|
|
do DRM, it's only stopping them from prohibiting other from releasing
|
|
software they want to use and making the software they want to make.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
Also, if the GPL'd program produces output for DRM or communicates
|
|
through a protocol which imposes Digital Restrictions Management, they
|
|
must give you the necessary codes to write the other side, an
|
|
authorised server. So, essentially we've tried to cover all the
|
|
bases. Any way that they can try to use a GPL covered program in such
|
|
that way that block you or forbid you to change it or write the other
|
|
software that works with it, that's not allowed. They have to respect
|
|
your right to change the software and write other interoperable
|
|
software.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
So, that's how we deal with DRM. Mostly by not dealing with it at
|
|
all, we just guarantee your freedom so that the people whose goal it
|
|
is to take away your freedom cannot succeed.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p id="software-patents-grant">[section: Second main change: software
|
|
patents part 1, explicit patent grant]</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
The next major area is that of software patents. Now, we took care of
|
|
the most direct issue in version two with the "Liberty or Death"
|
|
clause. What we've done with version three is a few secondary things.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
First of all, in GPL version two we rely on an implicit patent
|
|
licence. The issue is: what if the company who distributed the GPL
|
|
covered program has a patent that applies to something in the program?
|
|
and what if they say "We'll distribute this to you under the GPL but
|
|
if you try to use the rights that the GPL gives you, we'll sue you for
|
|
patent infringement"?
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
In the US they can't. In the US, by distributing the program to you
|
|
under the GPL they're saying they have no objectins if you carry out
|
|
your rights under the GPL, so if they then try to sue you for doing
|
|
so, they will lose. However, this isn't necessarily true in other
|
|
countries. Some other Free Software licences in the past several
|
|
years have had explicit patent licence grants and we decided to follow
|
|
them. We're putting in an explicit patent license grant which says,
|
|
more or less, what US law would do implicitly.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
But then there's another peculiar case. What if someone distributes
|
|
the software to you under the GPL and he has a patent licence saying
|
|
that nobody is going to sue him, that the patent holder will not sue
|
|
him when he distributes the software, but you, when you distribute the
|
|
software might be sued by the same patent holder. In fact we could
|
|
imagine that the patent holder is going around threatening everybody
|
|
all the time.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
That would be a bad thing because it would mean that the freedoms
|
|
might not be really there. This one distributor gets to enjoy the
|
|
freedoms and he's supposed to respect your freedom but he could be
|
|
taking advantage of the fact that the patent holder will sue you if
|
|
you try. So it's sort of a collusion between these two companies to
|
|
make your freedom a sham. So GPL version three says that if he is
|
|
knowingly relying on a patent licence for his own right to distribute
|
|
this, without getting sued for patent infringement, he must make sure
|
|
that you are protected too. He has to negotiate his license so that
|
|
it includes everything that's implied by his releasing of his version
|
|
which includes your changing the program and your releasing and so on.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
However, there's a subtlety here. The big companies have made blanket
|
|
cross-licences. IBM and Microsoft surely have a blanket patent cross
|
|
licence for all the patents they have and will ever have, and IBM
|
|
doesn't even know what the Microsoft patents cover and IBM has one of
|
|
these with every other big company that's involved closely with
|
|
computers or software.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
So IBM has patent licences for loads of things that they don't know.
|
|
So the result is that they could have a patent license that makes them
|
|
safe and they don't know it. So, we said that it's not fair to put
|
|
them in a worse position than you would be in just because they have a
|
|
blanket cross-licence and somebody else is explicitly negotiating a
|
|
licence, so we said, alright, it will only apply if you knowingly rely
|
|
on a patent licence. So if IBM has a patent licence as part of a
|
|
blanket cross-licence and doesn't know, then this doesn't apply to
|
|
them, but if they find out that this problem is happening and they
|
|
have a patent licence, then they have to do something. IBM doesn't
|
|
seem to like this very much.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p id="software-patents-retaliation">[section: Software patents part
|
|
2, narrow retaliation]</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
Anyway. There is one little bit more about dealing with software
|
|
patents. We're concerned about the case where somebody modifies a GPL
|
|
covered program and has a patent covering the modifications and never
|
|
releases [the program]. If he releases it, he will be giving the
|
|
patent licence grant to all the users. So there'll be no problem, so
|
|
what if he never releases the program, he just runs it on his
|
|
webserver?
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
Then he's not giving the patent licence grant to anybody. So he might
|
|
say "I modified this GPL covered program to do this job, and if you
|
|
write your own program to do this job, you write your own code to do
|
|
this job, I'll sue you for patent infringement". So, you may say that
|
|
at that point, he loses his rights to make more copies and to modify
|
|
the program and so on. So basically, for business purposes, his uses
|
|
will be untenable. And this way, we protect against that threat.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
Now, there are many other Free Software licences that have some other
|
|
software patent retaliation clause. Some of them are designed to
|
|
retaliate only against aggression. Some of them, in licences that
|
|
were written for one company, sometimes retaliated for any suits
|
|
against that company. That's not a good thing. Suppose, for
|
|
instance, that Company A releases a program that says the licence
|
|
terminates if you sue Company A for patent infringement. Well that
|
|
might seem reasonable since suing anyone for software patent
|
|
infringement is a bad thing, but suppose Company A has a lot of
|
|
patents and it goes around suing others, so suppose Company A sues
|
|
Company B for patent infringement. What Company B wants to do then is
|
|
to sue Company A is the aggressor and Company B is retaliating, so
|
|
when B retaliates, B loses her right to use that program because the
|
|
program licence says if you sue Company A you lose the right to use
|
|
this program. So what this means is that it is retaliating for
|
|
retaliation, so it's actually supporting aggression by Company A.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
Anyway, we looked at these various kinds of software patent
|
|
retaliation clauses and we decided that we didn't want to put any of
|
|
them in the GNU GPL, except the one that I described for you five
|
|
minutes ago. The very limited one in the case where somebody makes
|
|
patented changes and doesn't release them. But, there is a way that
|
|
other patent retaliation clauses can get into programs covered by GNU
|
|
GPL version three and this brings us to the third main area of changes
|
|
which is increased compatibility with other licences.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p id="licence-compatibility">[section: Third main change: licence
|
|
compatibility]</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
First of all: what does compatibility mean?
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
Suppose we have two or three programs and each one has its own licence
|
|
and you would like to merge them or link them together. Can you do
|
|
that? Well, each of these licences might make a condition about the
|
|
licence of the combination. So, the question is: is there anyway you
|
|
can satisfy both of these licences at once? If there is, then the
|
|
licences are compatible, you can make a combination because there is a
|
|
way to licence the combination that satisfies both of these licences.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
But if there's no way to licence the combination so as to satisfy both
|
|
of these requirements together, the combination can't be released.
|
|
That means the licences are incompatible.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
Now, licence incompatibility is a fact of life. There have always
|
|
been incompatible Free Software licences. I'd say the most glaring
|
|
kind of incompatibility concerns the licence of TeX, which is
|
|
incompatible with itself.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
[laughter]
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
If you have two programs that are released under the licence of Tex,
|
|
you can't merge them at all. The reason is that the licence of Tex
|
|
says that the only way you can distribute a changed version is by
|
|
distributing the original version plus a change file - a patch file.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
So think about it, you have these two programs both released that way
|
|
and you want to merge them. How will you distribute the merged
|
|
version. How will you distribute the merged version? Well, this
|
|
program says you have to distribute this program plus the change file,
|
|
but this [other] program says it has to be this particular program
|
|
plus a change file. It can't be both at once, so the licence of TeX
|
|
is incompatible with itself.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
The GNU GPL is a copyleft licence. The idea of copyleft is, the
|
|
licence says when you release a modified version it has to be under
|
|
this exact same licence. The result is that, generally, two different
|
|
copyleft licences are incompatible. Each one says the modified
|
|
version has to be under this license, the other one says, no, the
|
|
modified version has to be under this licence. If the two licences
|
|
are different, the modified version can't be under both at once. If
|
|
it's under this one, it's not under [the other] one.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
So, two different copyleft licences, generally, are incompatible. But
|
|
in GPL version three we tried a technique that we thought of to make
|
|
GPL version three compatible with more licences. Now, GPL version
|
|
three is compatible with some licences. Namely, simple permissive
|
|
licences. Things like the X11 licence, the revised BSD licence, and
|
|
several other important Free Software licences are simple, permissive
|
|
Free Software licences.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
Now, the reason they're compatible with GPL is because they don't make
|
|
any requirement which is inconsistent with the GPL. You can take the
|
|
GPL and put it on top of those licences and those licences don't
|
|
object, because they're very permissive.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
And there's another class of licences which are compatible with GPL
|
|
version two, these are the disjunctive dual licences. The typical
|
|
example is the licence of PERL. It says "you can use this under the
|
|
GNU GPL or the Artistic licence". This is a disjunction between two
|
|
licences. A or B. And because the GNU GPL is one option, the licence
|
|
of PERL is compatible with the GNU GPL.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
So, some other Free Software licences are compatible with the GPL
|
|
version two. There are many that are not because they have other
|
|
requirements that are not in the GPL and since the GPL version two
|
|
does not allow adding any requirements whatsoever, any licence that
|
|
contains any other requirement that is not in GNU GPL version two is
|
|
incompatible with GNU GPL version two.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
So, what we have done in the draft of GPL version three is we have
|
|
said there is specific list of certain kinds of requirements that you
|
|
can add. And these include some rather trivial requirements that we
|
|
think you could add anyway, like saying "my licence must be
|
|
preserved", "my copyright notice must be preserved", that does no
|
|
harm. And terms like, "you have indicate somehow that it's a modified
|
|
version". GPL has always required you indicated modified versions but
|
|
it does so in one particular way. But you could add code with a
|
|
different requirement for noting modifications and GPL version three
|
|
says it's compatible. It accepts that.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
And, another particular kind of requirement is patent retaliation
|
|
clauses. Within a certain range, those that are not subject to abuse,
|
|
we had to work very carefully to design a description of those patent
|
|
retaliation requirements that do not support aggression, and those are
|
|
the ones we permit.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
And finally, we permit the "Affero" requirement. The Affero
|
|
requirement is found in the Affero General Public Licence, the Affero
|
|
GPL. The Affero GPL is like GNU GPL version two but it has one other
|
|
requirement, and that is, if you put the program on a publicly
|
|
accessible website, you have to release the source code of your
|
|
version.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
This is a requirement about public use of a program. So, that's one
|
|
kind of requirement that can be added. It's not in GPL version three
|
|
itself but it can be added.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p id="limits-of-requirements">[section: How the addable requirements
|
|
are limited]</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
Let me make something clear. You can't
|
|
just take existing GPL version three code and add additional
|
|
requirements. What you can do is write your own code with these
|
|
requirements placed by you on your own code, or merge in somebody
|
|
else's code which has these requirements placed by him on his code,
|
|
and when it's merged in, these requirements remain only on the code
|
|
that they were applied to. So they don't actually spread to the rest
|
|
of the program. If you're using the whole program, of course it
|
|
includes that part, so you have to follow the requirements for that
|
|
part. But they stay on that part, so if you delete that part
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
[From here onward, battery and memory limitations prevent the
|
|
recording from being complete]
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<h2>Questions and Answers session</h2>
|
|
|
|
<p id="q10-gfdl">
|
|
Q1: Is GPLv3 useful for documentation and/or compatible
|
|
with the GNU Free Documentation Licence?
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
Richard Stallman: The two licences are incompatible, but they're just
|
|
wholly incompatible. They're two very different copyleft licences and
|
|
two different copyleft licences are always going to be incompatible.
|
|
The GNU GPL has requirements that are extremely inconvenient for
|
|
anyone who wants to publish printed books such as manuals. So, it's
|
|
not a good idea to use the GNU GPL for a manual. So, I developed a
|
|
different licence for manuals, a licence which I developed
|
|
specifically with the idea of encouraging commercial companies to use
|
|
it for their manuals. I put in certain features that I hoped would
|
|
make it easier to make a profit selling these copylefted manuals and
|
|
another special feature which is supposed to make it more comfortable
|
|
to release a standards document under this licence.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
There's a special kind of section called the "endorsements" section
|
|
which can say "This is the official Foobar standard" and anyone who
|
|
makes a modified version of the document has to delete that section,
|
|
so it will not say that this is an official version of the standard.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
And you can put that together with an invariant section saying "if you
|
|
don't see a section saying this is the official version of the
|
|
standard, then it is not". And so, if your goal is to make sure
|
|
everyone knows whether your book contains the official version of the
|
|
standard, this will do it. Now it's sad that most standards
|
|
organisations real goal in publishing their standards is to make money
|
|
from them, so they refuse to cooperate at all, but we want it to be
|
|
possible for them to cooperate so that when we pressure them to
|
|
cooperate, we need to make it practical for them to cooperate, and the
|
|
GNU Free Documentation Licence does.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
So these things are incompatible with the GPL.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p id="q20-affero">
|
|
Q2: It seems the Affero clause is clearly designed to protect people
|
|
who use software through their browser...
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
Richard Stallman: No that's not true, but continue. That was not our
|
|
intention. I'll explain but we'll take a look at your question and
|
|
then I'll explain.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
Q2b: Ok, my question which may be based on false premises, is: why was
|
|
the decision made to keep the Affero clause as an option?
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
Richard Stallman: We don't want make that kind of change in the
|
|
licence of all the existing GPL covered programs. Some people don't
|
|
want that. We were considering putting this feature in the GPL but we
|
|
decided it would only be active if the program did something to
|
|
activate it. And then I realised that if you want to consider ways to
|
|
activate it, this way is just as good as any.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
Anyway, this is not really a matter of protecting a user who does
|
|
things through a browser. It's not about that actually, it's about
|
|
Person A writes a GPL covered program for use on websites, and
|
|
releases it, and Someone B makes improvements and runs them on his
|
|
website and doesn't release them and sees no reason to ever release
|
|
them because he instead he just sells the right to use it through his
|
|
website. Then, developer A finds that he's working at a disadvantage.
|
|
Every time he makes changes, B can get them, but every time B makes
|
|
changes, A cannot get them. So, this way, if A releases under the
|
|
Affero GPL then B has to publish his changes because he's providing
|
|
public access use.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
So that gets rid of the problem.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
Now, the issue you brought up is a real issue, but it's a different
|
|
kind of issue. You see, we try to make sure that you have freedom to
|
|
change and redistribute and run the program as you wish, but that has
|
|
to be your copy. Obviously we don't want to give you the freedom to
|
|
change someone else's copy because he's the one that's supposed to
|
|
have control over his copy, so to have these freedoms you've got to
|
|
have your own copy. In fact, this is not just a matter of what the
|
|
GPL says, it's a fact of life, it can't be avoided. If you don't have
|
|
your own copy of the program, you don't have control. Someone else
|
|
can hold your copy for you, you might use a timesharing service, and
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
[The recording is interrupted again]
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p id="q30-cooperating-with-osi">
|
|
Q3: [Unrecorded, but the question was about cooperation
|
|
with Open Source Initiative]
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
The Free Software movement, which I founded in 1983 focuses on
|
|
freedom and community, on human rights for software users. "Open
|
|
source" was founded in 1998 as a way to stop talking about those
|
|
things. To hush them up, to bury them, put them out of people's
|
|
sight. So they talk about practical advantages that come from using
|
|
the software. Well, I also talk about practical advantages in my
|
|
speeches. So here's what I say [Stallman outlines a large circle with
|
|
his hands], and here's what they say [Stallman outlines a smaller
|
|
circle within the first circle] - except that they go into more depth
|
|
on it, and that is useful, y'know. Making the case to businesses that
|
|
they will get some practical advantage out of releasing their software
|
|
under, usually, a Free Software licence, that's useful, but the point
|
|
is it's still a more superficial part of the issue.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
So they still say they want to cooperate, and they wish we would
|
|
cooperate by forgetting what we consider the most important thing and
|
|
joining them in saying only the superficial part. This is the way
|
|
Eric Raymond puts it, he's very clever at asking us to abandon the
|
|
most important thing and making it sound like he's only being
|
|
reasonable.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p id="q40-creative-commons">
|
|
Q4: [inaudible but he mentions "the creative common licence"]
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
Richard Stallman: There is none.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
Q4b: There isn't?
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
Richard Stallman: There is no such thing as "the Creative Commons
|
|
licence".
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
Q4c: Not for software
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
Richard Stallman: There is no such thing.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
[laughter]
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
And the reason I'm responding in this way is that this error is
|
|
extremely common
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
[The recording is interrupted again, Stallman goes on to explain that
|
|
there are many Creative Commons licences, and some are free and some
|
|
are not free, so the "Creative Commons" label does not indicate
|
|
anything meaningful in relation to freedom.]
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p id="q50-osi-responds">
|
|
Q5, by Michael Tiemann, President of Open Source Initiative: About a
|
|
question you were asked earlier about Eric Raymond, I want to point
|
|
out a fact which is that while Eric Raymond was formerly the president
|
|
of OSI, he no longer is.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
Eric, does speak for himself, but less and less for the OSI. I would
|
|
also like to clarify that as president of OSI, I have always supported
|
|
the GPL as the model licence for developers. The licence is the only
|
|
licence I have released work under aside from the LGPL for my own
|
|
programming.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
I recognise your position, which is to say that if I am not talking
|
|
about freedom, first and foremost, then I am burying it, but I think
|
|
of it myself differently...
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
Richard Stallman: Well, you might be doing something in between.
|
|
There are things in between. When Eric Raymond was president of OSI,
|
|
I could perceive his intention to bury talk of freedom very clearly.
|
|
And there are others who talk about "open source" who clearly are
|
|
trying to bury software freedom. That doesn't imply that everyone who
|
|
uses the term... what is true about their use of the term is that it
|
|
generally doesn't call attention to freedom very much.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
Q5b, Michael Tiemann: Well, at this conference I do want to support
|
|
that what you are doing is incredibly valuable and I respect that, and
|
|
thanks.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
Richard Stallman: Thank you.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p id="q60-translations">
|
|
Q6: [barely audible, the question is about making official
|
|
translations of the GPL, and the audience member advocates FSF making
|
|
official translations because otherwise the courts will have to make
|
|
their own translations which may be done with less care.]
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
Richard Stallman: The danger with an official translation is, if we
|
|
make a mistake, it could be an absolute disaster.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
... and we can't read Portuguese. I can't and Eben Moglen can't. And
|
|
even if we could, that doesn't mean that either of us would understand
|
|
it as a lawyer. You see, if I work with him when writing GPL version
|
|
three in English and I can say "well, here's what I think I want" ask
|
|
him to tell me if it really does what I think it does.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
Working like that in foreign languages would be much harder, so
|
|
producing a translation of the GPL in any other language would be much
|
|
harder than what we've already done and I can't trust this. I don't
|
|
know who I can trust this to do. I know lawyers in various country
|
|
who strongly support the Free Software movement, but to entrust this
|
|
to them is a so much... especially when a mistake can destroy things
|
|
world wide.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
Now, I considered the idea that maybe we'd have translations that
|
|
would be limited to one country. At least that puts certain amount of
|
|
bounds on the amount of disaster that a mistake would cause.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
Another thing I imagined - I just had this idea today - I don't know
|
|
whether it's a good idea, we could make translations and say "this
|
|
translation is only valid for one year unless it's renewed or replaced
|
|
by another more accurate translation". We can't do that with the GPL
|
|
itself. If we could change the GPL and force people to switch to a
|
|
new version of the GPL, we could take away their freedoms, but the
|
|
English version of the GPL does not work that way. Once you get a
|
|
program under version X of the GPL, you can always use it under
|
|
version X of the GPL forever. So, as long as that remains true, maybe
|
|
it's ok if the translations can be revised, so that if there is a bad
|
|
mistake in a translation, maybe we can fix it. I don't know if this
|
|
is really acceptable. I have this argument which I can argue that
|
|
it's acceptable because the real English version will not be
|
|
revokable, but I'm not convinced this argument is strong enough. I'll
|
|
have to talk to people about it.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
Q6b: That's easy for you because you live in an English
|
|
speaking country, but in Brazil where there is a different language
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
Richard Stallman: I agree with you but that's not the point. The
|
|
reasons why it would be good to have translations are obvious. The
|
|
point is: can we get rid of the danger?
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
So this idea that I had today might be an acceptable way to get rid of
|
|
the danger, and if so, we'll have translations.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p id="q70-fragments">
|
|
Q7: [inaudible]
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
Richard Stallman: ...and if some program in the set allows
|
|
Tivoisation, then they can Tivoise, so if enough important programs
|
|
move to GPL version three, Tivoisation will be practically speaking
|
|
not feasible.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
Of course, this depends on these programs moving to GPL version
|
|
three.
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
Q7b: [inaudible]
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p class="indent">
|
|
Richard Stallman: Ah, no, but the point is that those things will be
|
|
rather old, and at some point it's just not useful to use them
|
|
anymore. They're not a reasonable option because the code has been
|
|
released so long
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
<p>
|
|
[The recording gives up]
|
|
</p>
|
|
|
|
|
|
<h2 id="links">Getting more information</h2>
|
|
|
|
<ul>
|
|
|
|
<li>FSFE: <a href="gplv3.html">FSF Europe's GPLv3 project page</a></li>
|
|
|
|
<li>FSF: <a href="http://gplv3.fsf.org/">The GPLv3 website</a></li>
|
|
|
|
<li>FSF: <a href="http://gplv3.fsf.org/draft">The current draft of GPLv3</a></li>
|
|
|
|
<li><a
|
|
href="http://www.ifso.ie/documents/gplv3-launch-2006-01-16.html">A
|
|
transcript of the opening session of the first international GPLv3
|
|
conference</a> (Eben Moglen discusses the changes made to the
|
|
license)</li>
|
|
|
|
<li><a href="http://www.ifso.ie/documents/rms-gplv3-2006-02-25.html">A transcript of
|
|
Richard Stallman's GPLv3 talk from FOSDEM 2006</a></li>
|
|
|
|
<li><a href="torino-rms-transcript.html">A transcript of
|
|
Richard Stallman's GPLv3 talk from Torino</a></li>
|
|
|
|
<li>FSF: <a href="http://gplv3.fsf.org/wiki/index.php/Reusable_texts">The page
|
|
on the official GPLv3 wiki listing transcripts and similar texts</a></li>
|
|
|
|
</ul>
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
</body>
|
|
|
|
<timestamp>$Date$ $Author$</timestamp>
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</html>
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