Fedora Freedom and linux-libre

[jeff]

Les Mikesell wrote:
> jeff wrote:
>>
>>
>> To me it appears quite clear that Broadcom is distributing a GPL'd 
>> file, and thus has to turn over the source code.
>>
>> Now you may argue this exempts them from this (but it probably still 
>> doesn't):
>>
>>   * Firmware is:
>>  *      Derived from proprietary unpublished source code,
>>  *      Copyright (C) 2000-2003 Broadcom Corporation.
>>  *
>>  *      Permission is hereby granted for the distribution of this 
>> firmware
>>  *      data in hexadecimal or equivalent format, provided this copyright
>>  *      notice is accompanying it.
>>
>>
>>
>> But what about in versions distributed for years where that was not 
>> included?  That text above is recent addition. To my surprise when I went
>> to download the driver on their page I found I had an old 
>> ~/devel/broadcom directory with a file linux-7.3.5.zip containing 
>> files timestamped from 2004 (the above copyright was added in 2005).
>>
>> Here, the bcm5700-7.3.5-1.src.rpm file was tagged "GPL".
> 
> 
> I'd take that to mean that they didn't understand the GPL when they 
> originally used it

Pffft. "Oh, sorry, we didn't know what the license meant, we're just a billion 
dollar company with 100 lawyers". That doesn't mean they can suddenly un-GPL 
something.

> and corrected the situation by removing it.  So what 
> you have is a non-gpl'd binary file with permission to redistribute - 
> which is far from unique.

And you're missing the other point: THEY ARE STILL DOING IT TODAY, as I 
mentioned earlier. Go to their website, it says it's GPL.

As a side note, it was added by RedHat to the main kernel and RedHat is still 
shipping it under the GPL too.

-Jeff