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BusyBox and Xterasys Settle GPL Lawsuit
Monday, December 17 2007 @ 02:39 PM EST

BusyBox has just successfully settled its GPL ligitation against Xterasys. Xterasys has agreed to stop all binary distribution of BusyBox until the Software Freedom Law Center confirms that it has published complete source code on its web site. After that, Xterasys' "full rights to distribute BusyBox under the GPL will be reinstated." Remember I explained to you that is how it works, that you can't just download again and get your GPL rights back that way? Remember that long discussion? Well, here is the proof. Xterasys has agreed to appoint an internal Open Source Compliance Officer and will pay an undisclosed amount to the BusyBox plaintiffs.

In short, BusyBox prevailed, and the GPL did what it was designed to do.

Here's the press release:

**************************

BusyBox Developers and Xterasys Corporation Agree to Settle GPL Lawsuit

NEW YORK, December 17, 2007 -- The Software Freedom Law Center, provider of pro-bono legal services to protect and advance Free and Open Source Software (FOSS), today announced that it has settled the GPL violation lawsuit filed on behalf of BusyBox developers Erik Andersen and Rob Landley against Xterasys Corporation.

BusyBox is a lightweight set of standard Unix utilities commonly used in embedded systems and is open source software licensed under the GNU General Public License (GPL) version 2. One of the conditions of the GPL is that re-distributors of BusyBox are required to ensure that each downstream recipient is provided access to the source code of the program. Many Xterasys networking products include BusyBox, but the company did not provide source code to its users as required under the GPL, so SFLC filed a copyright infringement lawsuit against the company.

As a result of the settlement, Xterasys has agreed to cease all binary distribution of BusyBox until SFLC confirms it has published complete corresponding source code on its Web site. Once SFLC verifies that the complete source code is available, Xterasys' full rights to distribute BusyBox under the GPL will be reinstated.

Additionally, Xterasys has agreed to appoint an internal Open Source Compliance Officer to monitor and ensure GPL compliance, and to notify previous recipients of BusyBox from Xterasys of their rights to the software under the GPL. Xterasys will also pay an undisclosed amount of financial consideration to the plaintiffs.

"Although we regret that we had to file a lawsuit, we are pleased that Xterasys will now comply with the GPL," said Dan Ravicher, Legal Director of SFLC.

About the Software Freedom Law Center

The Software Freedom Law Center -- directed by Eben Moglen, one of the world's leading experts on copyright law as applied to software -- provides legal representation and other law-related services to protect and advance Free and Open Source Software. The Law Center is dedicated to assisting non-profit open source developers and projects. Visit SFLC at http:// www.softwarefreedom.org.


  


BusyBox and Xterasys Settle GPL Lawsuit | 206 comments | Create New Account
Comments belong to whoever posts them. Please notify us of inappropriate comments.
BusyBox and Xterasys Settle GPL Lawsuit
Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, December 17 2007 @ 02:45 PM EST
I'm first, and I don't know what to do!

[ Reply to This | # ]

O/T (off topic) here, please...
Authored by: jbeadle on Monday, December 17 2007 @ 02:54 PM EST

And remember to make licks clinkable per the instructions in red...

Thanks,
-jb

.

[ Reply to This | # ]

What about the Verizon / Actiontec Lawsuit?
Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, December 17 2007 @ 03:17 PM EST
Isn't that one about the very same issue?

[ Reply to This | # ]

NewsPick discussions here
Authored by: PolR on Monday, December 17 2007 @ 04:48 PM EST
'cause they need to be sorted out

[ Reply to This | # ]

Corrections here
Authored by: PolR on Monday, December 17 2007 @ 04:49 PM EST
But are there any to report?

[ Reply to This | # ]

Off-topic here, please
Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, December 17 2007 @ 05:11 PM EST
Please don't start any of the 'canonical' threads as Anonymous: some folk browse
with Anon blocked, and then they don't see it.

[ Reply to This | # ]

"each downstream recipient"? "its users"?
Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, December 17 2007 @ 08:02 PM EST

I roll my eyes in despair. When even GPL plaintiffs can't grok the GPL, what hope for distributors?

The issue isn't that "downstream recipients" or "its users" weren't given the source. While technically correct, that's a mischaracterisation of the core idea of the license, which is that any third party should be able to get the source. Don't take my word for it: read the license. I really wish more people would.

[ Reply to This | # ]

What people need to remember
Authored by: inode_buddha on Monday, December 17 2007 @ 08:23 PM EST
Every time something like this comes up, there is a flood about "Oh, the
GPL hasn't been tested in a US court". What people need to remember is that
they might as well be asking for copyright law itself to be tested -- that
*nothing* else gives permission to copy, distribute, etc. It doesn't matter if
you're a Joe Average like me, or a huge multi-national. The same rule still
applies. Sometimes when reading slashdot, I have to suppress a giggle of mirth
when people fail to realize that respect for intellectual property goes both
ways -- its a two-way street.

---
-inode_buddha
Copyright info in bio

"When we speak of free software,
we are referring to freedom, not price"
-- Richard M. Stallman

[ Reply to This | # ]

Settlement. A spin doctor's view
Authored by: brian on Tuesday, December 18 2007 @ 12:34 AM EST
I'll say this right up front...

IANAS (I am not a spin doctor) but this post is an attempt
to spin this story around. I don't for one minute believe
any of it....

If I was a spin doctor, this line would be spun so fast it
would break the sound barrier:

"Xterasys has agreed to appoint an internal Open Source
Compliance Officer and will pay an undisclosed amount to
the BusyBox plaintiffs."

I always shudder when I see "settlement" in the same
breath as the the words "undisclosed amount of money".
First, why is it "undisclosed"? Aren't court settlements
public? If not, then maybe that needs to change. Anyway, I
meander from the spin. The spin I would put on this, were
I so inclined, would be that they sued for the money
instead of the principles of the GPL. If I was a large
monopoly who shall remain nameless, I would use that as a
disadvantage to owning FOSS in general, and GPL in
specific. I would spin it to equate what the RIAA /
MPAA settlements are to the settlement here. I would spin
it in such a way to show that GPL authors were just as
greedy as proprietary ones and worse, don't have a moral
high ground when money is waved in the air.

Boy, that post sure hurt to write...;-)

B.

---
#ifndef IANAL
#define IANAL
#endif

[ Reply to This | # ]

This isn't proof
Authored by: Anonymous on Tuesday, December 18 2007 @ 01:30 AM EST
I don't believe that this case proves that clause 6 of the GPL cannot be used to
restore lost rights under the GPL. I think that Xterasys agreed to all of the
SFLC's conditions in order to make this go away, and probably to reduce the
amount of money they had to pay. Since SFLC is interpreting the GPL in the same
way PJ does, they are requiring the people they sue to make statements agreeing
with their position. Unfortunately, to prove their interpretation one way or
the other would require a court case in which the argument was presented, which
seems unlikely, because any company using this argument would still be liable
for copyright infringement. I'm sure it's far cheaper to pay SFLC's fees and
publish your code, which is exactly what we see everyone doing.

I have to say that I am disappointed in the Busybox people and in the SFLC. They
claim that the companies they are suing were unresponsive. Frankly, I don't
believe it. I'd like to see some real efforts being made to communicate with
these companies before resorting to suing people. At the moment they look an
awful lot like the patent trolls, and I'm sure it's not good for the general
image of free software. Nobody likes a bully, even if they happen to be right.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Why SFLC is suing based on BusyBox
Authored by: MDT on Tuesday, December 18 2007 @ 08:09 AM EST
IANAL

My feeling is that Moglen has been looking for the perfect GPL product to
enforce the GPL for, and has found it.

Think about it, if as PJ and others believe (and as I read it from what I've
read of the GPL) if SFLC sues over say, Linux, that company can *never* get
their rights back, because a lot of the original copyright holders are dead,
with no clear line of ownership of the copyrights. Once they file suit, the
license is revoked officially, and that company can never get their license
back. Even if you had clear title to all copyrights firmly established for
living people, you'd have to track down *ALL* of them to re-establish.

Busybox on the otherhand, is all copyrighted by 2 people. Additionally, it's
very popular in certain uses, and so there are a lot of potential infringers.

Popular + Small Copyright owner group = Perfect GPL software to sue over to
establish precedent for GPL validity and give teeth to SFLC and GPL in general.
I'd not be surprised if Moglen didn't search far and wide to find the Busybox
opportunity. I don't think it's about money, I think it's about setting up a
*lot* of precedent, and I think he's almost hoping to run into a stubborn
company to go the distance with to establish GPL bonafides in a very legal and
long-standing way.

Just my $0.02 worth.



---
MDT

[ Reply to This | # ]

BusyBox and Xterasys Settle GPL Lawsuit
Authored by: Anonymous on Tuesday, December 18 2007 @ 09:41 AM EST
> SFLC can only sue on behalf of people who have authorized
> it to do so. Only the licenses from those people are
> revoked.

Who SFLC sues is moot in regard to rights to distribute. It is the license that
grants and terminates your permission to copy.

From GPL V2:
Any attempt otherwise to copy, modify, sublicense or distribute the Program is
void, and will automatically terminate your rights under this License.

The lawsuits merely attempt to enforce the copyright, they don't grant or
terminate it. And since the GPLv2 doesn't cover reinstatement of the rights,
that's why it's prone to debate.

[ Reply to This | # ]

BusyBox and Xterasys Settle GPL Lawsuit
Authored by: pengdahl on Wednesday, December 19 2007 @ 01:58 AM EST
There is an interesting analysis of the MySQL case here:

Findlaw

Note this part:

Professor Moglen further stated that the Free Software Foundation’s position is that failure to comply with the GPL terminates distribution rights of the person failing to comply until the copyright holder takes affirmative action to reinstate the rights. Note that this position requires an affirmative act by the copyright holder to reinstate the right to distribute, not an act of the person who distributed the software to the breaching party. In her order granting partial summary judgment, the judge in the Progress Software litigation seemed to imply that a breach of the GPL by failure to include source code possibly could be "cured" by shipping source code in later versions. This view contradicts that of Professor Moglen.
So it would seem that at least one commentator on the case thought at the time that the position of the judge might contradict the position of the SFLC.

[ Reply to This | # ]

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