Re: GPL V3 and Linux - Dead Copyright Holders

[Linus Torvalds <torvalds@osdl.org>]

On Thu, 2 Feb 2006, Pierre Ossman wrote:
> 
> So taking open software and closed hardware and combining it into something
> that I cannot modify is ok by you?

But you CAN modify the software part of it. You can run it on other 
hardware.

It boils down to this: we wrote the software. That's the only part _I_ 
care about, and perhaps (at least to me) more importantly, because it's 
the only part we created, it's the only part that I feel we have a moral 
right to control.

I _literally_ feel that we do not - as software developers - have the 
moral right to enforce our rules on hardware manufacturers. We are not 
crusaders, trying to force people to bow to our superior God. We are 
trying to show others that co-operation and openness works better.

That's my standpoint, at least. Always has been. It's the reason I
chose the GPL in the first place (and it's the exact same reason that I 
wrote the original Linux copyright license). I do _software_, and I 
license _software_.

And I realize that others don't always agree with me. That's fine. You 
don't have to. But I licensed my project under a license _I_ agreed with, 
which is the GPLv2. Others who feel differently can license under their 
own licenses. Including, very much, the GPLv3.

I'm not arguing against the GPLv3. 

I'm arguing that the GPLv3 is wrong for _me_, and it's not the license I 
ever chose.

			Linus