Fedora not "free" enough for GNU?

Arthur Pemberton pemboa at gmail.com
Fri Sep 19 14:59:03 UTC 2008


On Fri, Sep 19, 2008 at 9:51 AM, Rahul Sundaram
<sundaram at fedoraproject.org> wrote:
> Arthur Pemberton wrote:
>>
>> 2008/9/19 Ignacio Vazquez-Abrams <ivazqueznet at gmail.com>:
>>>
>>> On Thu, 2008-09-18 at 08:58 -0400, jude ui wrote:
>>>>
>>>> And to repharse my question - Can't you guys reselse the firmware as
>>>> opensource - are they prosperity drivers? (correct me if I'm wrong)
>>>
>>> The firmware is not Fedora's to release. The hardware vendor releases it
>>> as a binary blob due to at least one of 3 concerns:
>>>
>>> 1) Regulatory issues
>>>
>>> Hardware vendors need to prevent end-users from modifying the firmware
>>> so that the hardware can not be driven outside legal ranges.
>>>
>>> 2) Intellectual "Property" issues
>>>
>>> Hardware vendors don't want other hardware vendors to know how they run
>>> their hardware so that their design can't be copied or stolen.
>>>
>>> 3) Inability to build
>>>
>>> Firmware is usually code for some PLD or ASIC, which needs specialized
>>> (and EXPENSIVE) compilers to build. Most people are unlikely to be able
>>> to turn the source into the firmware.
>>
>>
>> Only 3 seems valid to me. But I at least understand 1 and 2.
>
> 1 is a serious concern as well legally. Linux kernel now has a framework to
> support this.
>
> http://lwn.net/Articles/294675/
>
> Rahul


Isn't 1 also the main reason GNU disagrees with the binary firmware?
Disallowing the purchases of hardware from utilizing it how they would
like to?

-- 
Fedora 9 : sulphur is good for the skin
( www.pembo13.com )




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