GPL & "non profit use only"

[Jos Visser (OSP)]

IANAL, but:

The GPL itself does not discriminate between for-profit and
not-for-profit purposes. That distinction is also against the open
source definition (http://www.opensource.org/docs/definition.php, item
6: No Discrimination Against Fields of Endeavor).

*HOWEVER*, the copyright holder is free to license his/her source code
under pretty much whatever license he/she wants (even if it's a silly
one). Saying: This source code is licensed under the GPL v2 with the
proviso that you cannot use it in a for-profit endeavor is possible.
However the project does no longer agree with the open source
definition.

There is a whole legal minefield around people creating custom
licenses or forks of existing licenses (e.g. the SANE license). In
this case the interesting issue is if you take the source code, change
it and make the source code available again. Because of the viral
effect of the GPLv2 the modified source code is also licensed under
the GPLv2, but I wonder if the proviso is also viral.

In any case I would not agree that the license proviso/exception is
meaningless. If you use the source code you refer to in a commercial
product you are violating the license terms.

</jos>

-- 
You get what you want, if you're really honest