Post Syndicated from Bradley M. Kuhn original http://ebb.org/bkuhn/blog/2010/03/15/gpl-consistency.html

Most of you are aware
from one of my
previous posts that It’s a Wonderful Life! is my
favorite film. Recently, I encountered something in the software
freedom community that reminded me of yet another quote from the
flim:

GEORGE:

Look, uh … I think maybe you better not mention getting your wings around here.

CLARENCE:

Why? Don’t they believe in angels?

GEORGE:

I… yeah, they believe in them…

CLARENCE:

Ohhh … Why should they be surprised when
they see one?

Obviously, I don’t believe in angels myself. But, Clarence’s
(admittedly naïve) logic is actually impeccable: Either you
believe in angels or you don’t. If you believe in angels, then you
shouldn’t be surprised to (at least occasionally) see one.

This film quote came to my mind in reference to a concept in GPL
enforcement. Many people give lip service to the idea that the GPL, and
copyleft generally, is a unique force that democratizes software and
ensures that FLOSS cannot be exploited by proprietary software
interests. Many of these same people, though, oppose GPL enforcement
when companies exploit GPL’d code and don’t give the source code and
take away users’ rights to modify and share that software.

I’ve
admitted that the copyleft is merely a strategy to achieve maximal
software freedom. There are other strategies too, such as the Apache
community process. The Apache Software Foundation releases software
under a permissive non-copyleft license, but then negotiates with
companies to convince them to contribute to the code base publicly.
For some projects, that strategy has worked well, and I respect it
greatly.

Some (although not all) people in non-copyleft FLOSS communities (like
the Apache community) are against GPL enforcement. I disagree with
them, but their position is logically consistent. Such folks don’t
agree with us (copyleft-supporting folks) that a license should be used
as a mechanism to guarantee that all published and deployed improved
versions of the software are released in software freedom. It’s not
that those other folks don’t prefer FLOSS; they simply prefer a
non-legally binding social pressure to encourage software sharing rather
than a strategy with legal backup. I prefer a strategy with legal
strength, but I still respect non-copyleft folks who don’t support that.
They take a logically consistent and reasonable approach.

However, it’s ultimately hypocritical to claim support for a copyleft
structure but oppose GPL enforcement. If you believe the license should
have a legal requirement that ensures software is always distributed in
software freedom, then why would you be surprised — or, even
worse, angry — that a copyright holder would seek to uphold users’
rights when that license is violated?

There is great value in having multiple simultaneous strategies ongoing
to achieve important goals. Universal software freedom is my most
important goal, and I expect to spend nearly all of my life focused on
achieving it for all published and deployed software in the world.
However, I don’t expect nor even want everyone else to single-minded-ly
support my exact same strategies in all cases. The diversity of the
software freedom community makes it more likely that we’ll succeed if we
avoid single point of failure on any particular plan, and I support that
diversity.

However, I also think it’s reasonable to expect logically consistent
positions. A copyleft license is effectively indistinguishable from the
Apache license if copyleft is never enforced when violations occur.
Condemning
community-oriented⁰ GPL
enforcement (that seeks primarily to get the code released) while also
claiming to support the idea of copyleft is a logically inconsistent and
self-contradictory position. It’s unfortunate that so many people hold
this contradictory position.

---

⁰There
are certain types of GPL enforcement that are not consistent with the goal
of universal software freedom. For example, some
so-called “Open
Core” companies are well known for releasing their (solely)
copyrighted code under GPL, and then using GPL enforcement as a mechanism
to pressure users to take a proprietary license. GPL enforcement is only
acceptable in my view if its primary goal is to have all code released
under GPL. Such enforcement must never compromise about one point: that
compliance with the GPL is a non-negotiable term of settling the
enforcement action. If the enforcer is willing to sell out the rights
that users’ have to source code, then even I would condemn, as I have
previously, such GPL enforcement as bad for the software freedom
community. For this reason, in all GPL enforcement that I engage in, I
make it a term of my participation that compliance with the terms of the
GPL for the code in question be a non-negotiable requirement.