Pandigital Novel (Android-based tablet) violating GPL

[Angus Gratton]

Hi everyone,

Have found yet another Android device manufacturer violating GPL.

California-based company Pandigital make the 'Novel', which is sold as
an e-reader in partnership with Barnes & Noble.

Their frontend is built on Android, and I've identified that it contains
at least two GPL licensed components - Linux kernel & busybox(*).

I sent a friendly email to Pandigital asking where I could get GPL
sources and got a belated response:

"The source code will be available but is not at this time."

I've emailed back and reminded them that this is not an avenue of GPL
compliance, they have released a product with GPL components and
therefore they are legally and ethically required to comply now and not
at some undisclosed future time.

I'm inclined to contact the busybox people and see if their lawyers are
interested in pursuing it further. Although if people here think that
"will be available" is an acceptable response (I personally do not) then
I'll leave it at this for now.

Regards,

Angus


(*) Yes - another Android with busybox! In this case it's a bit funny,
the latest "S10_07_18K_PD_INX7E_ENG_6410PO" firmware contains a complete
busybox multi-call executable (with a suite of supported applets) inside
a single file /system/bin/ifconfig. Bit of a WTF, but it's still GPL
licensed software!