The Free Software Foundation (FSF) today released the following statement in response to claims by Microsoft regarding their obligations under the GNU GeneralPublic License version 3 (GPLv3).
Microsoft cannot declare itself exempt from the requirements of GPLv3
In its November 2006 deal with Novell, Microsoft attempted to use its patent portfolio to divide and conquer the free software community. It did so by extending narrow and discriminatory promises not to sue certain classes of Novell SUSE GNU/Linux customers for patent infringement, while leaving others vulnerable to attack, including noncommercial developers and users of other GNU/Linux distributions. Microsoft's ultimate aim in this scheme was the de facto proprietization of free software: it hoped that frightened users would be willing to pay one favored distributor just to be safe from lawsuits. Though the details and timing were a surprise, it was no isolated incident; Microsoft has engaged in anticompetitive conduct in the software industry for many years, and has sought to attack free software for almost as long.
We, the Free Software Foundation, responded to Microsoft's threat by revising the draft of version 3 of the GNU General Public License (GPLv3). In particular, we added a provision to ensure that, if any user receives a discriminatory patent promise from Microsoft as a result of purchasing a copy of a GPLv3 program from a Microsoft fulfillment agent, Microsoft would be bound by GPLv3 to extend that same promise of safety to all downstream users of that software.
In its press release dated July 5, 2007, Microsoft announced that it was withdrawing discriminatory promises of patent safety it previously made to certain Novell customers. We regard Microsoft's decision with satisfaction. FSF first requested the withdrawal of those discriminatory promises in a meeting with Microsoft's general counsel, Brad Smith, on November 9, 2006. (We have no opinion on Microsoft's legal obligations to the intended beneficiaries of the repudiated promises, or to Novell.)
We do not, however, agree with Microsoft's characterization of the situation involving GPLv3. Microsoft cannot by any act of anticipatory repudiation divest itself of its obligation to respect others' copyrights. If Microsoft distributes our works licensed under GPLv3, or pays others to distribute them on its behalf, it is bound to do so under the terms of that license. It may not do so under any other terms; it cannot declare itself exempt from the requirements of GPLv3.
Microsoft has said that it expects respect for its so-called "intellectual property"--a propaganda term designed to confuse patent law with copyright and other unrelated laws, and to muddy the different issues they raise. We will ensure--and, to the extent of our resources, assist other GPLv3 licensors in ensuring--that Microsoft respects our copyrights and complies with our licenses.
The Freedom Task "We have as a primary goal to help corporations to adhere to the licences from the onset, rather than to have to enforce violations later," explains Mr. Coughlan. "We encourage those responsible for compliance for their company to contact us, so we can work together to avoid licence compliance problems, rather than having to later solve problems that could have been avoided in the first place."
KDE Joins "The desktop is one of the most important battlefields for the long term success of Free Software. In the antitrust case it has become apparent how Microsoft could take its quasi-monopoly on the desktop and use it as leverage in other areas. FSFE is helping to put an end to this in the EU antitrust case, but this is not enough: We need to put an end to proprietary desktop monopolies that made such abuse possible," Georg Greve explains the background for FSFE's decision to take action in this area. "Together with the KDE e.V. we seek to break the stranglehold on the desktop, give people freedom, and explain to them why this is important, and why they should not give it up again."
Free Software Directory reaches 4,000 packages The recognition the Directory has received has also increased. It was profiled on lwn.net on August 25, 2004 [http://lwn.net/Articles/97521/]. At the FSF's first annual members' meeting, in March 2003, Richard Stallman, President of the FSF, named the Directory as his first choice of the two most important projects the FSF had undertaken in the past five years. Almost 90% of the packages in the Directory are licensed under the FSF's own GPL or LGPL licenses.
FSFE Files Application According to Greve, FSFE meets Microsoft and other adversaries of freedom in various venues these days: "Yesterday there was a hearing in Brussels regarding the 'Intellectual Property Rights European Enforcement Directive' (IPRED2) - a directive pushed by the rights-holding industry to raise the barriers around their distribution monopolies. Last week we discovered how Microsoft was able to rewrite the Vienna Conclusions on ICT and Creativity for the World Summit on Information Society (WSIS). Earlier this summer we helped save Europe from the serious troubles caused by software patents."
Three residents of Lakeland, Fla., were indicted today by a federal grand jury in Alexandria, Va., related to their participation in a conspiracy to sell millions of dollars of pirated computer software.
Maurice A. Robberson, 58; Thomas K. Robberson, 54; and Alton Lee Grooms, 56, were charged with one count each of conspiracy to violate copyright and counterfeiting laws for their participation in a conspiracy to sell more than $5 million in counterfeit copyrighted software. Maurice Robberson was also charged with a substantive count of felony copyright infringement and one count of trafficking in counterfeit goods, while Thomas Robberson was charged with one substantive felony count of copyright infringement and two counts of trafficking in counterfeit goods.
Scientists and engineers have created and successfully tested a set of algorithms and software programs which are designed to enable the 19 individual mirrors comprising NASA's powerful James Webb Space Telescope to function as one very sensitive telescope.
NASA researchers will present findings on these algorithms and software programs, called the "Wavefront Sensing and Controls" at the Optics and Photonics meeting of the Society for Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE) meeting. The SPIE meeting will be held at the San Diego Convention Center, 111 West Harbor Drive, San Diego, Calif., August 26-30. The session, called "TRL-6 for JWST Wavefront Sensing and Control" will be on Sunday, August 26 from 11:30 a.m. - 11:50 a.m. PDT, in room 29B, and is Paper 6687-7 of Conference 6687.
IBM will distribute the Solaris Operating System (OS), from Sun and Solaris Subscriptions for select x86-based IBM System x servers and BladeCenter servers to clients through IBM's routes to market.
The agreement is an extension of IBM's existing support for the Solaris OS on select IBM BladeCenter servers. IBM and Sun's support of interoperability via open standards also means that customers will be able to extend their infrastructure by connecting new platforms easily, while preserving their initial investments.
NASA has added a new computer program to help monitor the four gyroscopes that keep the International Space Station properly oriented without the use of rocket fuel. During a spacewalk on Monday, two astronauts from the space shuttle Endeavour removed and replaced a gyroscope that failed in late 2006.
Computer scientists at NASA's Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif., designed the new software for the space station. The Inductive Monitoring System will be added to a group of existing tools to identify and track problems related to the gyroscopes.