What if Bob, in scenario #4, decides to change his name to "SUSE" and
then decides to charge more than shipping for his shrink-wrapped
project? Hasn't Bob/SUSE violated the GPL, even though Bob/SUSE may
tack on some proprietary plug-ins/enhancements?
On Thu, 2003-05-15 at 02:29, Dylan William Hardison wrote:
> > I guess I'm concerned that someone will steal it and make it into their
> > own product and start selling it.
>
> That should be a non-concern, really, and here is why:
>
> Hypothetical Story:
>
> --- Begin Story ---
> Alice writes a program to organize recipes.
> Alice GPL's her program, and puts it up for download,
> so that it is both free like beer and free like speech.
> Let's say, she puts it up on source forge.
>
> We'll call the program that Alice wrote Ogre.
>
> Bob is a mostly a baker, but he is also a average programmer.
> Bob, being a baker, would like a way to keep track of
> his recipes using a computer.
>
> Bob finds Alice's program, Ogre, and installs it.
> He finds that it works perfectly, except he'd like to
> be able to search by ingredient. Well, Bob is a programmer, he can add
> that feature!
>
> He looks at the Ogre source code, and sees that it is written in Perl.
> Bob knows perl like the back of his hand, so he studies the code,
> and once he understands it, and adds the feature.
>
> Now, a number of things can happen:
>
> 1) Bob sends a list of his changes to Alice, so she can merge them with
> her version of Orge. Alice will fall in love with Bob, they'll get
> married, and have 3 children, and live happily ever after.
>
> 2) Bob does nothing; he keeps his changes to himself/his company.
> This is perfectly OK, the GPL doesn't forbid this. He is free
> keep his changes private, so long as he or his company are the only
> ones using the program.
>
> 3) Bob sells his modified version of Ogre for $20 dollars, but keeps the
> source code to himself, even after users of it ask him for it.
> Alice discovers this, and sues Bob into bankruptcy.
> Bob looses his business, his house, and his car.
> Bob lives in an alley for the rest of his life, his only companions
> the rats.
>
> 4) Bob sells his modified version of Ogre for $20 dollars, including
> or at least allowing anyone interested to get the source code for
> free or for no more than the cost of shipping.
> Alice finds out, and includes his changes into her own version of
> Orge.
>
> 5) Bob gives his version away for free, source code and all,
> and informs people on the Orge download page, that if they
> want to, to buy some cakes or breads from him.
> Bob, perhaps, gets a few more customers.
>
>
> Now, say another person, Cindy.
>
> Cindy owns a Pizza place, and also could use a program like Ogre, so
> she gets a copy of Alice's version, and enjoys using it.
> Cindy would like to be able to have sub-categories of recipes.
> But, she isn't a programmer. She asks Alice to add this feature
> to Ogre. Alice says sure, for $400 dollars.
>
> Now, two things could happen:
>
> 1) Cindy agrees, pays Alice $400 bucks, and gets
> Ogre customized to her needs. Alice gets $400 bucks,
> and the rest of the world get the benefit of the
> new feature.
>
> 2) Cindy, devastated that Alice dare ask for soo much money
> to do such a simple thing, has a nervous breakdown,
> and starts collecting cats.
>
>
> Okay, now a guy named only "Dude", who was a former heavy-weight lifter,
> and now works at a retail sports outlet, starts selling an unmodified
> version of Ogre -- except he calls it Ralph -- for $90 dollars,
> and without the source code.
>
> Alice learns of this, and does one of two things:
>
> 1) She sues Dude for damages or the store where he works,
>
> 2) She uses her martial arts skills (which she acquired (with money gained
> from adding features to Orge, donations, and T-Shirt sales) from the
> local Judo school) and challenges Dude to one-on-one combat.
>
> Dude, now a quadriplegic, goes insane and starts acting
> like a humming bird.
>
> --- End Story ---
>
> Basically, the GPL means
> "Share and Share Alike", if someone makes your CMS into a
> product and start selling it, people won't buy it unless
> it offers something yours doesn't (probabbly, anyway...), or
> if they make a change, you can include that change in your version...
>
> Was that clear enough?
>
>
> BTW, someone mentioned patents... That's a bad idea. If you patent some
> software-thingy, a lot of people will hate you, and that's not something
> you want. Generally, software patents make people/organizations look
> bad. (ala Amazon).
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.3 : Fri Aug 01 2014 - 19:59:30 EDT