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Software Freedom Law Center Says Google's Draft VP8 Cross License is Compatible With FOSS Licensing ~pj | 215 comments | Create New Account
Comments belong to whoever posts them. Please notify us of inappropriate comments.
Software Freedom Law Center Says Google's Draft VP8 Cross License is Compatible With FOSS Licensing ~pj
Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 30 2013 @ 04:06 PM EDT
Well, *patents* are incompatible with FOSS. This is a patent license. So, duh.
I agree with the SFLC that software should not be patentable subject matter. Nonetheless, there are patent licenses that are not merely "compatible" with FOSS, but satisfy the definitions for Free and Open Source software as well.
You are asking Google to act like an idiot in an environment where it is being attacked on all sides with patents by proprietary goon companies determined to destroy FOSS.
I do not consider engaging in the pursuit of software freedom to be acting like an idiot. The fact that there may be "goon" companies out to get Google does not mean that Free Software advocates should redefine their goals.
Google has made no claims that this is a FOSS license. It's not. The question is, can FOSS developers rely upon it without sacrificing protections FOSS licenses provide? And the answer is yes.
One of the protections offered by FOSS licenses is to be free from field of use restrictions. Since FOSS developers can not rely upon Google's patent licensing to maintain this protection, I should think the answer to your question is actually "no".
That's about as good as it gets, currently, in the ugly patent universe. And as SFLC points out, this is the best license in existence for this category.
The V P3/Theora patent license contains no field of use restriction so, no, neither Google's VP8 Cross License nor their own patent grant are the best license in existence for this category.

Google has done a Good Thing with their development and release of the Webm formats; yet their patent licensing could be improved to be more consistent with the Free Software and Open Source definitions. It is not unreasonable for FOSS advocates to expect such improvements take place before offering their full endorsement.

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

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