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List:       busybox
Subject:    Conservancy has announced the coordinated license compliance effort
From:       "Bradley M. Kuhn" <bkuhn () ebb ! org>
Date:       2012-05-29 14:27:00
Message-ID: 87hauzvz9n.fsf_-_ () ebb ! org
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> Denys Vlasenko wrote on Saturday, 4 February:
>> we are listening to other peoples' opinions and we might consider
>> some changes to our license enforcement process. It would be arrogant
>> to think that we always do everything in the best way possible.

I replied on 7 February:
> Indeed, I agree with this fully.  I've been communicating with lots of
> projects who enforce (or seek to enforce) the GPL through Conservancy
> -- which includes BusyBox -- and hopefully we'll come to a consensus
> on GPL enforcement plans that takes into account input from everyone
> in the community.

Conservancy has announced today the culmination of the efforts that I
hinted at in my comment quoted above:
       http://sfconservancy.org/news/2012/may/29/compliance/
       http://identi.ca/notice/94102422
       https://twitter.com/conservancy/status/207450105597530112

There's been a lot of FUD in the last four months regarding GPL
compliance.  However, Denys' point above was right: there were some
valid criticisms hidden amongst the FUD.  The most important one was:
Linux copyright holders should be involved in compliance actions in
embedded systems.  Linux is a central component of embedded systems, and
it seemed the consensus of most active BusyBox developers that having
some Linux developers involved with compliance would be very helpful.

Conservancy has addressed this issue by building a broad coalition of
copyright holders in many different projects who seek to work on
compliance with Conservancy, including not just Linux and BusyBox, but
other projects as well.

As always, compliant distribution and adoption of Free Software are the
most important issues in Conservancy's compliance efforts.  Conservancy
generally engages in compliance actions in a friendly way, seeking to
help companies struggling with compliance to become productive members
of upstream work.  Occasionally, more aggressive methods are necessary,
but these have always been an absolute last resort and will remain such.

Finally, if any BusyBox copyright holders would like to be involved in
the effort and haven't been previously, feel free to contact
<compliance@sfconservancy.org> to get involved.
-- 
Bradley M. Kuhn, Executive Director, Software Freedom Conservancy
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