On Mon, 30 May 2022 09:24:28 +0200 Morten Linderud <foxbo...@archlinux.org> wrote:
> However, please realize that legal matters are down to > interpretations of text which can be interpreted narrowly or broadly. > Clarifying which interpretation you decide to understand the legal > text under is important. > > Neither of us are lawyers so lets hold off on claiming Arch is > putting mirrors in legal risk on this list because you decided to > read over the license text. Sure thing. To clarify: I'm not claiming this at all, I'm just wondering out loud whether this might be the case. > I did however check with someone close with Free Software matters and > they believe it should be fine. That certainly sounds like good news. Would you care to ask them to clarify this a bit more? > All of these assumptions are a narrow definition of the GPL2 and > GLP3. It's important to realize the GPL licenses are vague enough > that any bad faith interpretation of the text can easily be construed > to claim "you are violating the license". Most likely. Also, GPL enforceability is a whole other can of worms. Each (free) software license has its downsides. Maybe this is why there are so many of them. > Neither GPL2 nor GPL3 makes any strict claims the source needs to be > distributed from the same server as the binaries. To clarify: this was not what I said. I said that the GPLv2 does not allow distributing compiled software without accompanying the source code _or_ a written offer. > Section 6d claims "regardless of what server hosts the corresponding > source" and 6e open up for "peer-to-peer" transmission of the source. > It is only demanded it's explained how to get it, and that is done on > the archwiki free of charge as the license demands. I too believe that the Arch Linux project fulfills its obligations under the GPL just fine. The question is whether the mirror operators, who could be seen as completely separate entities but at the same time also distributors of copyrighted software, do too. > The main issue is "next to the object source"; If we regard > "archlinux.org" as the software distributor, and the mirrors an > extension of this service, then a broad definition of the above can > be interpreted as having links on "wiki.archlinux.org" for how to > access the source would be fine. > > Else you can email us and get a link, which you'd promptly get. > > The above coupled with the FAQ entry linked earlier and I don't think > we can be violating any license under a reasonable interpretation of > the GPL. I think 'reasonable' is the magic word most of the time in legaland. A hypothetical court case over alleged GPL violations would likely be preceded by a judge who is capable of coming to a reasonable verdict. That said, this thread is about hypothetical legal risks to mirror operators. If those risks are found to be substantial (and I must say that I don't feel qualified to make such a claim), then we should reconsider the optionality of source code mirroring. We could also consider encouraging mirror operators to mirror the sources as well, just to be on the safe side. > However, unless you start engaging someone who can deal with legal > matters we are only laymans that read the license and come to some > conclusion. If you think we are doing something different from what > other Linux distributions are doing please do tell us and we can > figure out how to solve any discrepancies. This is exactly what sparked my curiosity on this topic :) I've been using Debian for a long time before recently giving Arch a try. All Debian mirrors serve, alongside the binary packages, the original source tarballs (*.orig.tar.gz) and the Debian-specific patches (*.debian.tar.gz). Now as said in the forum post I linked earlier [1], there are a few Arch mirrors that mirror the sources too (it would be great if their operators can chip in!). These source packages contain both the original source tarballs and the Arch-specific patches, so kinda like how all Debian mirrors do it. [1] https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?pid=1778318#p1778318 > Speculating about the meaning of GPL is not really useful. Well it can be useful to discuss the "what ifs". Maybe we can all learn from this exercise. I agree that a copyright lawyer would be a lot more qualified to speak on this topic. Sadly I don't know any :/
pgpAyBIBFz7JB.pgp
Description: OpenPGP digital signature
