[Sussex] So... GPL v3, eh?

[Nico Kadel-Garcia]

Dominic Humphries wrote:
> Steve 'Dobbo' Dobson wrote:
>> So which one are you then?
>>
>>   
> I'm in the "still haven't read it all yet" camp.. but it's a big 
> improvement on the drafts, some of which worried me..
I approve of it as a necesary evil. Tivoization is a serious potential 
threat to free, or open, software.  So is patent encumbrance. I suspect 
that you folks here in the EU haven't seen the evils of software patents 
as thoroughly as I have from research work in the States, but it's a 
very handy for a big corporation to spend their money efficiently on 
lawyers to patent every little 3 lines of code or genuinely obvious 
implementations,  and use their patent portfolio to harass other 
companies or stifle innovators.

The patent issues of Novell and Microsoft *had* to be addressed, as 
quickly as possible. And Richard has been deeply concerned about DRM for 
some time, with cause. This helps avoid or reduce the stranglehold that 
could be applied via DRM on one side, and patents preventing anyone from 
themselves using the same DRM technology on the other, especially the 
new not-very-"Trusted Computing" DRM software.