Question regarding GPL and membership requirements for a standards body

[Hardy, Allan]

>> The issue is that the GPL requires that software must be provided free of licensing fees as mentioned in clause 2-c of the GPL v2:

Zigbee terms are not GPL compliant we agree on that.
I respectfully disagree that it is because of a membership fee.  Requiring membership at all is enough to be in conflict with GPL.

Assume Zigbee membership is free:

If I took a standard GPL product and embedded it in my hardware Device what are my GPL requirements?  - Primarily to provide source code for the GPL components.

If I take a Zigbee embedded in a linux distro, then put in my device what are my requirements? -  To become a member of Zigbee alliance, to follow what ever additional requirements are put on members, and to provide source code for GPL components.

The Zigbee terms are not GPL compatible because it discriminates against a class of users, as example commercial hardware vendors, it puts additional restrictions on my ability to use the GPL product, takes away freedoms of use I had, etc.

The fact that it also involves $ is a secondary issue, imho, not the main issue.    Zigbee could drop their fee to $1 or $0 and it still would be GPL incompatible.

>> This was the central point in the issue that was discussed regarding the spec's compatibility with GPL'd software.

Discussed where?  Even if it was the central point of the discussion, it is not the central point of GPL incompatibility.
At least that's my central point.  : )

Allan


From: legal-bounces at lists.gpl-violations.org [mailto:legal-bounces at lists.gpl-violations.org] On Behalf Of Akiba
Sent: Monday, June 22, 2009 9:03 PM
To: legal at lists.gpl-violations.org
Subject: RE: Question regarding GPL and membership requirements for a standards body

The issue is that the GPL requires that software must be provided free of licensing fees as mentioned in clause 2-c of the GPL v2:

2. You may modify your copy or copies of the Library or any portion of it, thus forming a work based on the Library, and copy and distribute such modifications or work under the terms of Section 1 above, provided that you also meet all of these conditions:

    * a) The modified work must itself be a software library.
    * b) You must cause the files modified to carry prominent notices stating that you changed the files and the date of any change.
    * c) You must cause the whole of the work to be licensed at no charge to all third parties under the terms of this License.

The Zigbee membership requirement for commercial projects becomes an implied licensing fee because what you're doing is paying the membership fee in order to gain permission to use their IP. If the lowest tier of membership had no charges attached to it, even if other tiers did, then people who wanted to make a commercial product based on GPL'd software would not need to pay the Zigbee Alliance to license their IP. Hence clause 2-c is satisfied. This was the central point in the issue that was discussed regarding the spec's compatibility with GPL'd software.

I'm a member of the Zigbee Alliance, but I can't expect my users to be. So the membership requirement would constitute a restriction placed on the software, since it uses Zigbee's IP. As far as we can see, this is a violation of (at least) the spirit of the GPL. Regarding software using the Zigbee protocol to be allowed to use the GPL, we're still trying to get a definite answer on this. However, at best, it looks like it's ambiguous.

Akiba
FreakLabs Open Source Zigbee Project
http://www.freaklabs.org
________________________________
From: Hardy, Allan [mailto:allan.hardy at lmco.com]
Sent: Tuesday, June 23, 2009 5:24 AM
To: Akiba; legal at lists.gpl-violations.org
Subject: RE: Question regarding GPL and membership requirements for a standards body


I just wanted to make a comment on a point made in the blog.  I am a bit of a sick guiy in that I like discussing this legal stuff :) just for fun.



Where you said:



"However after a bit more investigation, it turned out that the Bluetooth Adopter membership was free which would remove the GPL violation."



Why is payment or $ the basis of your analysis?  The GPL doesn't stop anyone from charging $ for using a GPL product.  It may not be a smart marketing move to charge for something that your customers can turnaround and offer for free, but the GPL doesn't prevent that.



I would have thought the right conclusion would have been along the lines of 'freedoms' not free costs.  Is there anything about the act of registering that restricts my freedoms under the GPL, meaning it deny's me rights or makes me surrender rights.



Paragraphs 4 and 6 of the GPL seem the most applicable here.  I copied them below just for reference.



As I understand the GPL I can charge you say $1000 to acquire my GPL based software.  If you choose to pay you can then use the software under the GPL.  Meaning you can give it away for free.  (which makes me changing upfront sorta dumb business practice).



What I can't do is charge you $1000 and then tell you that you must also charge.  I cant override/change the rights the GPL affords you.



Same goes with registration.  I can offer you my GPL products and require you to register, for free or not, in order to get the download.  You can then offer the product to others under the GPL.



What I cant do is tell you that if you offer the product to anyone else, you must have then register at my site or even at some other site, even if its free registration.  That would be me adding a superset of requirements around the GPL, which the GPL tries hard to not allow.



So back to Zigby



You release a linux implementation of the Zigby specification.  What Zigby doesn't want is a hardware guy embedding that linux/zigby stack and charging for the hardware product, without them being a member of the zigby alliance (again free or pay doesn't matter)



What license can you release your ziby/kinux stack under?  BSD, GPL, ?  Doesn't matter, what ever it is it must carry the caveat that if you use zigby/linux in a product (software or hardware) you sell you have to sign up.  Basically you must put the zigby/linux product pretty much under the same terms as Zigby has spelled them out with the restrictions on commercial use.




So, the way I am looking at it - Zigby is an issue not because there is $ involved, but because it adds restrictions/requirements on top of GPL for any downstream users - which GPL doesn't allow or support.  That restriction could be a free registration or a paid one, doesn't matter, it's a restriction/additional requirement on use of GPL product.


I think whomever put up the issue a the linux kernel discussion got it confused in the areas of commercial or not.





As to why Bluetooth doesn't have the same issue, I'd have to see the Bluetooth license/terms to be sure, but if it is for trademark use and not software use, then it would be in a whole different ballpark.



Allan