[ANNOUNCE] upstart 0.5.2 released

[T.Michal Turney]

I have read this whole thread and this appears to be most appropriate
message for this thought.

Quoting Scott James Remnant <scott at netsplit.com>:

> First off, please stop spreading FUD.
>
> If you have an actual issue with the GPLv3 as a licence, compared to the
> GPLv2, then please state what it is verbosely, clearly and without
> opinion.
>
> I can take that to our legal department for consideration, we can look
> into whether your concern is genuine, and if so consider whether it's
> the best licence for Upstart.
>
> Please don't just wave your hands and claim that the embedded, mobile,
> or other similar spaces "don't like the GPLv3".  We work in those
> spaces, we have partners in those spaces, and we ship a lot of GPLv3
> software.  We know that there is no problem.

What Sari danced around without explicitly stating is that while
corporate America might be uncomfortable with GPLv2, it is at least
understood.  It has been on the landscape for years with a lot of
time and money spent to dissect the legalese and understand what a
project team can and can't do with GPLv2 licensed software.

Having just completed an embedded mobile device with Linux, I have
recent exposure here.  I was the project team's envoy to the legal
team.  Under no circumstances were we allowed to consider any OSS
that was licensed GPLv3.

Sari's main point that this licensing decision will impact decision-makers
on whether to use Upstart should not be glossed over.  There is no way
to quantify the potential loss in the installed base of users.  However,
I believe it is safe to say that just seeing "GPLv3" in the license field
will turn some people away.

The people who walk away because of the sign on the window won't give
you a rational reason, or be able to point to a specific clause or
sentence in the license so it can be clarified.  They will walk away
because they have been given no choice.

One last point, the frontier that Linux excels at is the embedded space.
This sweet spot exists because corporate America (and corporate Germany
and corporate UK, etc.) has figured out they can ship cheaper consumer
products without paying licensing royalties.  Some of them are free-loaders
and some of them try real hard to be good community citizens.  Without
this market we wouldn't be having this discussion, as Redhat learned in the
late 90s,

GPLv3 is a hurdle or barrier to wider acceptance.  Whether it should
be or not is not really the point, it is a barrier.  This licensing
decision will impact how soon and how widely Upstart is seen as an
acceptable replacement for SysV init.
Cheers,
T.mike


>
> On Wed, 2009-06-17 at 12:12 -0700, Saravanan Shanmugham (sarvi) wrote:
>
>> Fedora and Redhat may not have issues with distributing GPLv3.
>> But I can guarantee you customers of Redhat, Monta Vista, etc which
>> include many large companies will have a problem with it. As I
>> understand it many of these companies do have a policy of not using
>> GPLv3.
>>
> Then how are they shipping any recent versions of just about any
> software?
>
> Large parts of the Linux software stack are already GPLv3, large parts
> of the library stack are already LGPLv3.
>
> And here's a little piece of information for you: the GPLv2 and LGPLv3
> are not compatible.  If you have a "GPLv2 or later" piece of software,
> linked to an LGPLv3 licence, the only way you can legally distribute
> that is (as you are permitted to do so) "under the terms of GPLv3".
>
>> So yes it will be a problem. Now Redhat/Monta Vista might package it as
>> part of the distro, but will most likely still leave SysVInit as part of
>> the distro and everyone with a policy of not using GPLv3 will not be
>> using it in their products.
>>
>> Also note that these same companies which see benefit in functionality
>> similar to Upstart WILL go off and do their own replacement. Which will
>> look a lot like upstart in functionality but be branched for licensing
>> reasons.
>>
> Then they're going to have to rewrite a lot of code, starting with the C
> compiler and working their way upwards.  Good luck to them.
>
> Meanwhile that effort will show them for what they are, free-riders who
> are taking advantage of Linux without contributing back or supporting
> its ecosystem.
>
> Scott
> --
> Have you ever, ever felt like this?
> Had strange things happen?  Are you going round the twist?
>