[openmoko-announce] Crossroads

[Martin Lefkowitz]

I was not aware of your work in the legal area.  It sounds like you are
biting the hand that feeds you.

If you succeed in getting companies afraid to be adding modules to a
kernel for fear of having to expose their detailed register layout to
the public either by documentation or code you will kill embedded
linux.  Then you can buy your sticker "Long live BSD", or worse windows
(mobile).

Marty

P.S. my understanding is that the linksys issue is actually what
happened.  How they dealt with it going forward is another issue.

Harald Welte wrote:
> On Wed, Mar 14, 2007 at 09:51:37AM -0700, Martin Lefkowitz wrote:
>   
>> I disagree with that premise that it is a nasty legal area. 
>>
>> Modules can be proprietary this is a fact. 
>>
>> Not only have I been directly involved in the development of such, but
>> have talked to people that did serious research on what is legal and
>> what isn't. 
>>     
>
> As you might be aware, I am myself heading the
> http://gpl-violations.org/ project, and in this process and function
> talking to many technical and legal experts in this area.
>
> And there is _nothing_ that is more of an indication of a grey area if 
> * you can find many lawyers and scientific legal researchers pro and con
> * you cannot find any evidence anywhere on the world on any of this
>
>   
>> If it were not then everybody would have already sued everybody.  
>>     
>
> I am doing my best.  And I would have probably dealt with more than 120
> cases (only a hand full had to go to court) if I didn't have this
> strange habit of doing actual development rather than just dealing with
> legal issues.
>
>   
>> it's only linksys that had to disclose their WRT54g code
>>     
>
> Whihc is obviously wrong and outdated information.
>
>   
>> I can almost guarantee you that no chip company is going to open
>> themselves up to that.  
>>     
>
> That is not the point.  You can never sue somebody to release their
> proprietary source code.  But you can halt their sales by halting them
> from further distributing a gpl infringing product.
>
> And I have hard evidence in my own hands that this works ;)
>