This is technically not true. It is an oversimplification of the common case, but what actually normally should happen is that:
1. The GPL requires the company to send the user a written offer of source code.
2. The user uses this offer to request the source code from the company.
3. If the user does not receive the source code, the user can sue the company for not honoring its promises, i.e. the offer of source code. This is not a GPL violation; it is a straight contract violation; the contract in this case being the explicit offer of source code, and not the GPL.
Note that all this is completely off the rails if the user does not receive a written offer of source code in the first place. In this case, the user has no right to source code, since the user did not receive an offer for source code.
However, the copyright holders can immediately sue the company for violating the GPL, since the company did not send a written offer of source code to the user. It does not matter if the company does or does not send the source code to the user; the fact that the company did not send a written offer to the user in the first place is by itself a GPL violation.
(IANAL)
https://social.kernel.org/notice/B1aR6QFuzksLVSyBZQ
Linus rants that the SFC is wrong and argues that the GPLv2 which the kernel is licensed under does NOT force you to open your hardware. The spirit of the GPLv2 was about contributing software improvements back to the community.
Which brings us to the question: what is this guy going to do with (presumably) the kernel source? Force the Chinese to contribute back their improvements to the kernel? Of which there are likely none. Try and run custom software on his medical device which can likely kill him? More than likely.
The judge's comments on the Vizio case are such that should this guy get his hands on the code, he has no right to modify/reinstall it AND expect it will continue to operate as an insulin pump.
This is about as ridiculous as buying a ticket on an airplane and thinking you are entitled to the source code of the Linux in-seat entertainment system.
One interesting link:
https://www.drugtopics.com/view/hacking-diabetes-the-diy-bio...
I would trust the people that hack on these systems to be even more motivated than the manufacturers to make sure they don't fuck up, it's the equivalent of flying a plane you built yourself.
A great analogy because people die that way. I personally would never push code to another person’s insulin pump (or advertise code as being used for an insulin pump) because I couldn’t live with the guilt if my bug got someone else killed.
And to the best of my knowledge none of the closed-loop people have died as a result of their work and they are very good at peer reviewing each others work to make sure it stays that way. And I'd trust my life to open source in such a setting long before I'd do it to closed source. At least I'd have a chance to see what the quality of the code is, which in the embedded space ranges from 'wow' all the way to 'no way they did that'.
which is why lots of systems and processes (sometimes called red tape) exist to try and prevent the undesired outcome, and dont rely on the competency of a single person as the weak link!
Advertising that code, IMHO would be as showing of you doing extreme sports, for example. I do not think is any bad. A good disclaimer should be enough to take away any guilt.
So the question really becomes - Are these people working on their own pumps with open source more or less invested than the random programmers hired by a company that pretty clearly can't get details right around licensing, and is operating with a profit motive?
More reckless as well? Perhaps. But at least motivated by the correct incentives.
Your "prototype" is a plane from the original manufacturer with no physical modifications but a software patch to use data from sensors the plane already had to prevent the computer from getting confused under high wind conditions in a way that has already caused two fatal crashes.
Now you have to fly somewhere and your options for a plane are the one with the history of fatal crashes or the same one with your modifications, and it's windy today. Which plane are you getting on?
Are you kidding me? How many times have you unwillingly introduced bugs into a code base you didn’t fully understand? That’s basically table stakes for software engineering.
Nobody said it was untested.
> How many times have you unwillingly introduced bugs into a code base you didn’t fully understand? That’s basically table stakes for software engineering.
Which applies just the same to the people the company hired to do it, and now we're back to "the people with a stronger incentive to get it right are the people who die if it goes wrong".
But if you do then wow. That really puts in perspective the kind of people that use hacker news. I’m gonna be more selective about who I bother replying to going forward.
Are you saying not having those things is dangerous? They should be required to publish all of that for safety-critical devices then.
> actual test hardware
Why would arbitrary people be unable to buy test hardware? Again something to be addressed if true rather than used as an excuse.
> the expertise of a ton of engineers that have worked on the project and understand how it can go wrong
Do they not have internet access? If they don't even work for the company anymore then that could be the only way to access that information.
Literally something which is happening on the linked Reddit page.
> not to mention all the regulations and verifications they’re subject to.
Regulations are for preventing someone else from harming you. You don't need a government incentive to protect you from yourself, you already come with that incentive.
I say this as someone who might modify my own medical devices because I'm so fucking jaded over the capitalist march towards enshitification and maximizing profit over human lives. There is simply no way random folks on the internet can test these types of systems to any reliable degree. It requires rigorous testing across hundreds to thousands of test cases. They at best can give you the recipe that works well for them and the few people that have voluntarily tried their version. That doesn't scale and certainly isn't any safer than corporate solutions.
I totally understand, that because of liability and some more availability of resources, you would expect a company product to be "safe". BUT: if it is your butt that is going to be in the line, then I bet you: you will be much more careful that a random engineer in some random company. About the resources available in a big company, they are usually more directed to marketing, legal (including lobbing to avoid right to repair) and oder areas to maximize revenue, and not exactly in quality.
I worked in 2 different big companies which worked in "mission critical systems" and boy! I can tell you some stories about how unsafe is what they do, and how much money is invested in "cover your ass" instead of making products better/safer.
This has fuck all to do with how much corporations care about people. It has everything to do with liability laws and how victims can get restitution. It has everything to do with the actual risks of installing random internet scripts versus the corporations who have to jump through regulatory hoops. And it's not to say corporations get everything right. They fuck things up constantly. But they fuck things up constantly with oversight and regulation and you want me to believe random internet users will make a better product without it. It's nonsense.
The “liability”, “scrutiny”, “regulation” only generate “cover your ass” measures, bureaucracy, red tape, costs, and hardly any real measure to increase quality or safety. My work is in such a critical mission systems company, and they don’t give a shit about safety, just are interested in coming out clean or not waste too much money in settlement with dead people relatives.
> but good luck convincing a court that your family deserves restitution for you installing a random script you found on the internet into your insulin pump.
And good luck fighting a Pharma corporation for whatever did wrong. BTW, you bring the CPAP topic. Maybe you can read this at leisure [1] in this case, because it was a huge scandal, they pay. But 90% of the time, they don’t. And even if this case, with legal cost deducted, and divided by all people, is not a real compensation (spoiler alert: it never ever is!).
Please note in this case they DID KNOW about the issue, and did nothing. So much for liability and scrutiny.
Everyone is standing on the shoulders of giants. You're not going from stone tools to jet engines in a month, but you could fix a bug in one in that time.
> They don't have the same due diligence requirements. They don't have the same liability.
Things that exist to try to mitigate the misalignment of incentives that comes from paying someone else to create something you depend on. Better for the incentives to align to begin with.
Notice also that these things are floors, not ceilings. The company is only required to do the minimum. You can exceed it by as much as you like.
> If I use a commercial device unaltered, it's the company's fault if the device fucks up or is defective and causes harm. If I install random internet software on my medical device and it fucks up and causes harm, it's my fault.
And then if the community version fixes a bug that would have killed you and you stick with the commercial version you can sue them for killing you. Except that you're dead.
> There is simply no way random folks on the internet can test these types of systems to any reliable degree.
Basically the entire population is on the internet, so the set of them includes all the people doing it for a corporation. Are they going to forget how to do their jobs when they go home, or when they or a member of their family gets issued another company's device and they want it to be right?
Instead they got McDonnell Douglas'd
As it turns out the motivations matter way more than you might think.
Why on earth would you think an experimental aircraft made by a hobbyist would be safer?
Sorry. I would be much more inclined to have something made by somebody passionate about it, as done by some guy that received hopefully some kind of instruction on how to do things and was then left alone.
In this context (GA) we are not comparing Airbus/Boeing with a garage build. We are comparing some small company making 2 seaters with your hangar and maybe 10 certified aircraft mechanics that will help you a lot on the process.
You're also equivocating. They made it extremely clear they are referring to hobbyist and other such groups with vague or unknown qualifications; whereas, you go in and make stipulated claims about small businesses with certified mechanics, etc. These two are clearly not the same category, making your argument non-responsive. It's also contradictory in terms of discussed liabilities and such, as the small company, and its mechanics, that whoever worked with, would have liability as well, as opposed to the "random git repo".
We aren't all building our own planes because it's worse, but because it's time consuming. I don't have 20,000 hours to burn learning about how planes work to make my own.
If we magically beamed the knowledge straight into people's heads and also had a matter fabricator, I'd imagine yes - everyone would build their own plane. And it might be safer, I don't know.
Point is, the ideas are not mutually exclusive. You can believe both and still resolve it internally and with the world
Also, building your own plane is absolutely worse, even if you do have expert-level knowledge. That's true for any complex design. Aircraft design, material sourcing, fabrication, assembly and quality control are all very different skill sets, but the real kicker is experience.
The reason why commercial aircraft are so safe is a lot of work goes into investigating and understanding the root causes of accidents, and even more work goes into implementing design fixes and crew training.
If you do then you probably have an undiagnosed mental illness.
Welcome to HN.
This reminds me of the time I found out there’s a ton of libertarians here that think drivers licenses are oppression.
The system can make up for this in other ways like repeatability of processes, redundancy, etc. Which is why commercial aviation is safer than general aviation, and also why I specifically worded my comment as being about the same model of plane - ie if instead of building your own experimental-class kit plane, you hired it out to a liability-limiting company hiring minimum-wage workers to follow the directions. I'm guessing such a thing is illegal per FAA regs, but that kind of proves my point.
For another example, have you experienced the medical system lately? Doctors are generally smart people, but that intelligence is squandered by having their attention smashed into 10 minute chunks, with the entire rest of the system revolving around blame passing - the end result is a lot of smart and well-meaning people ending up grossly incompetent through emergent effects. I would much rather be able to go to a doctor and trust whatever answers they gave me rather than having to do my own independent research and advocacy to drive the process. But that is not how the system we have works.
But I still trust the institutions around me to keep me safe. Obviously that depends on where you live, I wouldn’t feel the same way if I still lived in Brazil.
Last time I went to a doctor was about 3 years ago. They diagnosed me in 5 minutes, and took another 10 to treat me and write me a prescription. It was great, I loved it.
Sounds like you have this trust issue with lots of different areas of your life, it might be worth reexamining your own perspective. Or maybe you just have to move to somewhere that you do trust.
The big problem with this analogy is that it conflates three very important things:
- GA is more dangerous, period. Doesn't matter whether you build the plane yourself or if you bought it ready made (hopefully new, hopefully very well maintained if second hand)
- GA craft tend to have less experienced pilots than airliners, but even airliner pilots tend to do worse as GA pilots than when they're at work. The reason for that is simple: the processes are what keeps commercial aviation (mostly) safe.
- GA craft tend to kill the pilots, because they are more often than not the only person on the plane.
- GA craft have malfunctions like larger aircraft, there is nothing special about them in that sense. But there is something that they don't have that larger aircraft do have: redundancy. In electronics systems, in the design of the mechanical bits, and finally in the people.
- GA craft that are designed and built by their operators are experimental class for a reason: they are untested and so more likely to fail than the ones that are certified. The design processes for commercial aircraft are nothing compared to the design processes employed by what we'll call hobbyists to distinguish them.
- And finally, even though it is a fun analogy I only meant it from a skin-in-the-game point of view, a GA hobbyist is still going to do his level best to make sure that he's not going to get killed. Boeing executives only care about the bottom line, safety is a distant second. And based on my experience with the difference between the guts of various bits and pieces of avionics and the software that they run on compared to my experience looking at medical devices, their guts and the software that they run on I would be more than happy to bet that the loop hackers know as much more more about the failure modes of these devices as the manufacturers do.
Cleanroom manufacturing under sterile conditions is the main differentiator here, and that just applies to the hardware, and it is an art that the medical industry understands very well. Electronics is already at a lower level of competence and their software knowledge tends to be terrible, not to mention the QA processes on said software.
Programmers working for corporations don't necessarily suddenly grow an extra quality brain when they do their work.
PS: AIrcraft aren't assembled in cleanrooms.
Frankly, you don't have a damn clue on and are getting basically everything wrong in the process
I would think it's the opposite. People that hack on this only risk their own life. Companies risk many people's lives and will get sued. Of course the person doing the hacking doesn't want to die but they're also willing to take the risk.
The baseline worst-case scenario of messing this up on yourself is that you die.
Yeah, only their own life, yknow, something not particularly valuable or motivating to conserve for them, as opposed to the companies financials!
Provided they do not risk anyone elses, that is entirely their right.
- people try to wingsuit through narrow obstacles and miss
- people try to build their own planes and helicopters and die
- people try to build submersible vehicles to go see the titanic and, uh, don't have a 100% success rate
- people try to build steam-powered rockets and die
"It's their life, they won't fuck it up" doesn't exactly cover a lot of behaviors.
I'd argue home-rolling your own medical device firmware is closer to daredevil/"hold my beer" behavior than normal.
I would say that can have a lot to do with your average diabetic loop hacker.
You're comparing people with a death wish in disguise with people that are extremely motivated to improve the QOL and they're very careful about how they do this, in fact if you read up on this you'd notice the insane attention to detail and the very rigorous process, on par with what I've seen in industry and in fact probably better than most.
All of this talk in this thread makes me think back to a time when people were laughing at that Finnish kid that was making his own OS with his buddies. Surely nobody would ever trust their business, their property or the lives to open source.
I checked and this is actually hacker news, not the BSA.
There have been many people who "made informed decisions" about their medical treatments over the advice of professionals and ended up being wrong. They don't count as thrill seekers.
Even in other threads on HN, you'll find takes on this topic ranging from "I don't trust my device, so I do finger tests every day" to "I trust my vibes and my device and don't do finger tests anymore" which tells me there's a pretty wide spectrum along which hackers might fall.
I'm not at all arguing that it's impossible that someone would do a good job of hacking their device, let alone do better than pharma/med companies.
I just don't buy that everyone who hacks away at it will inherently do a better than said companies because their life is at stake. There are way too many examples of people taking their lives in their own hands and getting it wrong.
I look at these companies for a living. Every two weeks on average another one. I see their codebases. I interview their engineers. There is no magic sauce. It is rare that you come across a company that really gets engineering and that doesn't see the product as a minor obstacle on the way to profits. Medical device companies in general are not exceptional in this sense (though I am aware of one that is).
But fine, you think that the people that work for these companies are somehow better than that ones whose lives are at stake. I beg to differ.
That is not the point I'm making.
The point I'm making is that someone's life being at stake does not inherently make then better.
It may be the case that when all is settled, the courts determine that the letter of the license means others' obligations are limited to what the judge in the Vizio case wrote. And Linus can speak authoritatively about his intent when he agreed to license kernel under GPL.
But I think that it's pretty clear—including and especially the very wordy Preamble—not to mention the motivating circumstances that led to the establishment of GNU and the FSF, the type of advocacy they engage in that led up to the drafting/publication of the license, and everything since, that the spirit of the GPL is very much in line with exactly the sort of activism the SFC has undertaken against vendors restricting the owners of their devices from using them how they want.
You were right up to this point. Medical devices requiring a prescription must be obtained via specialized suppliers, like a pharmacy for hardware. These appliances are not sold directly to end users because they can be dangerous if misused. This includes even CPAP machines.
In theory, that written offer only needs to go to the device suppliers. Who almost universally have no interest in source code. When the device is transferred or resold to you, it need not be accompanied by the offer of source.
If that was true, anyone reselling an Android phone could open themselves up to legal liability. Imagine your average eBayer forgetting to include an Open Source Software Notice along with some fingerprint-encrusted phone.
That’s only an appeal to ridicule. If those are valid, here’s an opposing one:
If this is not true, then any company can violate the GPL all it likes just by funneling all its products through a second company, like a reseller.
That the GPL potentially fails to achieve what it intends to is neither a legal argument, nor particularly surprising.
E.g. this sort of thing https://www.tomshardware.com/video-games/pc-gaming/steam-che...
The GPL notably allows for the sale, it was legal here.
It's the contract that's the violation, isn't it? What would the first sale doctrine be if in order to get a copy you could be required to sign a contract not to exercise your rights under it? For that matter, how could state-level contract law override the federal first sale doctrine?
The "derivative work" hack also seems kind of fragile. The normal way to get someone to agree to something is that they need a right from the license, which they then don't get if they don't agree to it. But if it doesn't give them anything that they need then "there are ways to use the copy they own and have a right to use without agreeing to any additional terms" is more like the default you're trying to hack your way out of than something they're exploiting a loophole to get into, and where does that leave you if anything slips?
Suppose Alice is a three year old. She owns the copy, she presses the button and now she has a running copy even though she's not competent to enter into a contract, and then Bob buys it from her. Or Alice owns the copy and Carol presses the button, and then maybe Carol could be sued, but also maybe Carol lives in another country, and either way Alice now owns a running copy she never agreed not to sell. And then you want to be able to say "but that's cheating" except that it's not any less cheating than what you were doing to try to get them to agree to it.
EULA's get around this by forcing the end user to become a party to the contract via a click wrap agreement. There is usually no such click wrap agreement binding the distributor in the case of the GPL. And the GPL doesn't require the creation or maintenance of such a click wrap agreement so the manufacturer would be free to remove it even if the original software had one.
The copyright doesn’t go away when copies are sold to a distributor. Someone (probably the manufacturer) still has legal obligations to the copyright holder.
A sale of an object does not transfer those licenses (but those licenses are still valid on the seller - a manufacturer selling widgets will have to obey the GPL clauses. If an end user of this widget wants the source code, they have to go back all the way to the manufacturer, rather than any of the middle-men presumably).
This is false. The person transferring the device must either pass along the offer they received (GPLv2 clause 3(c), and only if performing non-commercial redistribution), or pass along the source code (GPLv2 clause 3(a)).
The GPL clearly specifies recipients, it doesn’t say anything about suppliers.
For the same reason you can't find an airplane entertainment system in the trash and call up the company and demand source code.
"The source code for a work means the preferred form of the work for making modifications to it. For an executable work, complete source code means all the source code for all modules it contains, plus any associated interface definition files, plus the scripts used to control compilation and installation of the executable."
If you file a statement of claim to a court that is just riffing on the theme of "Compiled binaries of GPL code are being distributed" - you won't get anywhere.
I implore you to learn how to identify the parties involved, which contracts get formed when and between whom, de minimis, exemptions to copyright, and the non-copyrightable parts of code.
It's subsequently transferred to you after presenting a prescription, without any accompanying offer of source code.
In other words, assume you are the second owner in all cases when it comes to certified medical equipment.
AFAIK if you find an Android phone in the trash, you are not entitled to source either since you never received the offer of source during a purchase transaction. You know that little slip of paper you toss as soon as you open some new electronics that says "Open Source Software Notice".
The licensee has to offer code to users (more precisely, to any third party). It doesn’t say they have to purchase anything to be a legitimate user.
By that logic, _any_ company can effectively ignore the GPL constraints by just selling it to a reseller, first; one that they have a contract with to _not_ offer the source code when they re-sell it.
It is my understanding that, if I use GPL in my code, and I distribute it to someone that then re-distributes it to someone else... the GPL is still binding. I don't see why that wouldn't be the case with hardware using GPL'd software.
As the original Reddit comment explains, Insulet is an American company.
That’s about as ridiculous as buying a plane and knowing you’re entitled to the gpl sources used.
Linus is arguing against a strawman that Conservancy never actually argued. See https://sfconservancy.org/news/2025/dec/24/vizio-msa-irrelev... for details.
> Which brings us to the question: what is this guy going to do with (presumably) the kernel source?
Yes, of course. It is abhorrent that people have devices implanted into their bodies and are in any way prevented from obtaining every last detail about how those devices operate.
> Separately, do you think it's remotely a good idea?
In rare circumstances, yes. See, by way of example, Karen Sandler's talk on her implanted pacemaker and its bugs, for specific details on why one might want to do so.
Where your interpretation means someone else needs to follow your whim for their own problem, despite the legalese stating otherwise.
I think that is an absurd position and I am sorry to feel the need to have to be blunt about it.
I think this sentence is very sad. Not only this is a hard accusation, it is also the primary argument of the anti right to repair movement. An argument that I think is extremely bogus and ill intentioned, and I particularly (like Mr. Rossman) viscerally dislike.
Maybe the primary motivation is a) curiosity, and b) just for kicks to know if they honor the license.
That happens every Tuesday, hardly newsworthy.
It's not like the OEM software also won't kill you: https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2025/dec/23/seven-abbott-free...
It should be noted that this is just one of three options that someone who wants to distribute binaries of GPL code can choose from. It's the most commonly chosen one, and one is only available for noncommercial distribution, so the odds are good that this is the option they are using.
The other available option is to accompany the binary with the source code.
That one leads to an interesting possibility where someone could end up with a binary and there is no one obligated to provide source to them. As far as I know this has not actually arisen, but it seems like something that is bound to happen sometime.
Suppose company X decides to make a generic hardware platform that other companies can buy to build their products on. X's platform is basically a small single board computer with WiFi, Bluetooth, dual, USB ports, a couple Ethernet ports, and some GPIO ports. X ports Linux to their hardware.
When X ships a system it comes with an SD card with a Linux distribution installed including their custom kernel. It is configured to boot from the first SD card slot, and then to run a custom login system that looks at the second SD card slot and if there is a card in there it mounts it, looks for an executable on its root name application.exe, and runs that as root. X includes in the box a small thumb drive with a copy of the source code for everything on the SD card.
The idea is that a company Y that wants to make something like a WiFi access point or an air quality monitor can buy these boards from X, put them in a case with whatever peripherals or sensors they need like air quality sensors, write the software for the application, put it on an SD card, and put that in the second SD card slot.
So lets say Y buys 1000 of these systems from X, builds 1000 of their access points or whatever from them, and sells them.
One of their customers asks Y for the source code of the GPL parts. Does Y have to provide it?
I'd say they do not. They are not making copies or derivative works. They are just receiving physical copies from X and passing those on unmodified to their customers. This should fall squarely under the First Sale Doctrine in US copyright law, and similar rules in other jurisdictions.
How about if they ask X for a copy?
X has made copies and derivative works and distributed them. But X satisfied their GPL requirements by including a thumb drive with the source with each board they shipped to Y.
That doesn't sound right to me.
A written offer is not the same thing as a contract.
A written offer on its own would not normally be directly enforceable in many (most?) jurisdictions, for the same sort of reason that retailers can't be held to incorrectly published prices (in the UK at least, a displayed price is an “invitation to tender”, not a contract or other promise) except where other laws/regulations (anti bait&switch rules for instance), or the desire to avoid fighting in the court of public opinion, come into effect.
But in this instance, the written offer and the response to that offer are part of the wider licence that has been agreed to.
The hell? Over here, the price tags are a sort of public contract, to which the seller pre-commits. The seller forgot to change the tags? That's not the buyer's problem.
The other solid bait & switch is advertising a product that they don't have any of to sell, in the hope that you'll come in and buy something more expensive (or lower value) instead.
> If distribution of object code is made by offering access to copy from a designated place, then offering equivalent access to copy the source code from the same place satisfies the requirement to distribute the source code, even though third parties are not compelled to copy the source along with the object code.
Similar clauses in Sec 6.
> c) Accompany the work with a written offer, valid for at least three years, to give the same user the materials specified in Subsection 6a, above, for a charge no more than the cost of performing this distribution.
Or, instead of theorycrafting reasons why it shouldn't work, you could "just" sue them and see if the judge agrees.
If you accept someones offer, provided it meets the rest of the criteria for a valid contract - congratulations you now have a contract. If the any party violates it, yes this is a breach of contract.
> A written offer is not the same thing as a contract.
An offer is a precondition and component of a contract
You don't have to be "guilty" of anything to be liable in civil law (which contract law is a part of). "Guilt" is a concept from criminal law. It isn't required for contracts to be enforceable.
In general (there are exceptions) offers alone aren't enforceable and don't result in a contract. You need other elements (agreement by the parties, plus something done in return for what's offered) for a contract to be formed - and then it's enforceable.
This does not force you to honor the original offer though.
It's not illegal to not honor written offers, it's illegal to distribute copyrighted material in violation of it's license.
On the shelves are three insulin pumps: one with a 5-year warranty, one at a bargain barrel price that comes with no warranty, and one accompanied by a written offer allowing you to obtain the source code (and, subject to the terms of the GPL, prepare your own derivative works) at no additional charge any time within the next three years.
Weighing your options, you go with pump #3. You write to the company asking for the GPL source. They say "nix". They're in breach.
This is not only possible but also prudent for a device which can also kill you.
The argument is over providing you the source code.
The offer of source code seems to be a way to facilitate the conveyance of source code through opt-in means separately from the object code rather than some legal trickery to create a user-licensee contract.
While the offer may indeed convey a licensee-user obligation, a compliant distribution would attach a license anyway, converting the user into a licensee and licensor to licensee in a recursive fashion
I wonder if lawyers specialize in this, it sounds very cool and not at all standard law, but somehow compatible with contract law
IANAL
I mean, the absolutely simplest, and cheapest, way for companies to comply with the GPL is to ship the source code together with the software. Stick it in a zip file in a directory somewhere. The company can then forget the whole thing and not worry about anyone contacting them and ranting about source code and the GPL. But no company does that.
The other simple way for companies to comply with the GPL is for companies to provide a link to download the source code at the same place that users download the program itself. If the user did not download the source code when they had the chance, that’s the user’s problem. This will also let the company ignore any GPL worries. No company does this, either.
(The GPL provides a third way for individuals and non-profits, which is not relevant here.)
What's the consideration in the written offer? Promises aren't enforceable in court. For a contract to be enforceable, it has to be an exchange of something, not a one sided offer.
In all likelihood, you would not receive the source code in the U.S., though. If deadset against release, the outcome would likely be that the offender would be fined and injoined from any further distribution.
But GPL is a contract
I think the distinction you are pointing would be between a gpl licensor-licensee contract, rather than a licensee-user contract.
(IANAL)
Not according to the original reasoning by its creators, but opinions differ wildly. However, this is irrelevant to the point; the written offer, which is separate from the GPL, is what is failing to be honored, not the GPL. If you did not receive such a written offer, the GPL, in itself, makes no guarantee that you have the right to the source code.
Wrong. The requirement to provide source code under the GPL is primarily governed by Section 3 of the GNU General Public License v2 and Section 1 of the GNU General Public License v3. The whole point of the the GPL is to make it so users of software could get source code to the software.
In my experience, this is quite common when the development of hardware is viewed as a cost center and is outsourced to various providers and teams. Those providers and teams churn a lot and nobody who worked on that is likely still involved with the company via contracts or direct employment.
Front line support people aren’t equipped to respond to these requests. If you’re lucky they’ll get bounced around internally while project managers play hot potato with the e-mail until it gets forgotten. You might get lucky if you go the corporate legal route, but more likely is that the lawyers will do the math on the likelihood of you causing them actual legal trouble for anything and decide it’s best to ignore it.
When I worked at a company that had a history of GPL drama one of the first things I did was enforce a rule that every release had a GPL tarball that was archived and backed up. We educated support people on where to forward requests. I handled them myself. 7 out 10 times, the person on the other end was angry because they assumed the GPL entitled them to all of our source code and they were disappointed when they only found GPL code in the tarball. It really opened my eyes to some of the craziness you get exposed to with these requests (though clearly not the polite and informed request in this Reddit thread) which is probably another reason why support staff are uneasy about engaging with these requests.
Well, if your non-GPL code was directly linked to, or closely interoperated with, any GPL code, those users would have been right.
If you want to argue that the FSF’s lawyers are wrong, please provide more detailed, and hopefully referenced, arguments (as opposed to plain assertions).
You have to construct your own view based on existing statute and vaguely related cases.
Google LLC v. Oracle America, Inc., 593 U.S. 1 (2021) is not a pro-FSF opinion.
Whether linking (dynamic or not) is a derivative work is defined by things like incorporation, similarity, and creative expression.
I think the FSF view is unreasonably confident in its public opinions where the current law is that each potential infraction is going to be decided on a case by case basis. Read 17 USC 101 for yourself and square that with FSF/Stallman opinions.
There's too much nuance to have a stance about what happens when you link a program. "It depends" is the only thing you can say.
They reference a less on point but better known case (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lewis_Galoob_Toys,_Inc._v._Nin...., for some reason you have to manually add the period at the end of the link) about whether NES cheat cartridges were copyright infringement. If a work that directly links to and interoperates with a program is a derivative work of that program, the Game Genie really was illegal after all. To me that doesn't seem right, and given the FSF's general opinion on console restrictions (https://www.fsf.org/bulletin/2025/winter/new-nintendo-drm-ba...) I kinda feel like they'd have to agree.
That doesn't fit into the dynamic linking absolutists worldview at all.
The FSF could help a lot here by publishing demand letter templates outlining the statutory and precedential basis for license enforcement and recovery of damages.
The GPL grants rights to use and distribute, but does not grant ownership. It’s not suddenly in the public domain.
Yeah there are are startups where head guys don’t know that and developers jump the gun because they feel like they’re ones that have the best understanding of the issue at hand.
But of course that’s legal territory.
Please for the love of all that the FSF thinks is holy - just file a damn lawsuit if you are telling me they are violating the law. State your claim and have a court sort it out.
It costs hundreds of dollars. For a medical device? Seems like a good deal.
Making a blog post about someone elses copyright being violated is even more annoying to me.
Edit: My point is this is just another one of many annoying people you have to deal with who will email you alleging all sorts of legal violations, who don't themselves understand anything about the claims they are making.
They want the Linux kernel source code.
My understanding of the concept of "basis" does not fit the context of sending an email, and "reason" is the closest I can find that fits.
Basis being concerned with rules or authority. The assumption being when asking "what is the basis for X?" that there was a bar that needed to be met beyond the doers motivations. That there needed to be more than they wanted to. Which of course, does not apply to sending an email. I could email you right now asking you what your favourite type of fish is or seeing if you want to play a game of chess, no basis needed. I'd just need a reason to.
But sounds like we agree, they have no real basis for making a demand.
Just "there is no basis" as a response would be like saying "yes" or "no" to "have you stopped beating your wife?"
Whether you have a reason to make a claim is much different than whether you have a legal basis for your claim.
You can just do that. No GPL, open source, enforcement, demands, etc language needed. Just "I'm trying to do X, can I see the code for Y?". I receive and send them at work pretty frequently.
They've mentioned the GPL as a way to try to increase the chances of getting sent the code. A support person for a medical device company might not know anything about software licences or linux or GPL. If the company has some sort of "send GPL code to askers" policy and Lost-Entrepreneur439 just asks for the linux kernel, the support person might not know that the GPL policy applies and just say no. If you include it in your message then it increases the chances of them typing "GPL" in to whatever internal knowledge bank they have and seeing "for GPL requests, forward the enquiry to jeff@ourcompany.com" or something like that.
The GPL isn't between Lost-Entrepreneur439 and the company so I don't think "enforcement/exercising a legal right" is an accurate way to describe what we're talking about. That would be if the copyright holders to the linux kernel get involved.
EDIT: Although that seems like largely just a semantics thing. Like if a judge orders a company to pay you some money and you say "give it to austhrow743" is it valid to say that I have a right to that money? Or is it that you have the right that I get that money? If someone wants to phrase "linux kernel copyright holders have a right to demand users of their code share it with anyone who asks" as "anyone who asks has a right to that code" then I don't really have a problem with that.
I just see a big difference between making a request and making a claim. I don't need to think I'm legally entitled to something to ask for it. I don't even need to think that getting it is likely. Whereas Abigail appears to be treating sending and receiving requests by emails as equivalent to a court summons.
They make a blog post about GPL violations which allege the company is violating the law.
I'm absolutely begging for anyone in a similar situation to prove it. The reasons those emails were sent is because they think they have a legal entitlement to be sent the source code. *PROVE IT*. It's cheap!
In my country people have a common law right to enforce the law themselves without having to pay legal fees. In America it's a statutory right I believe.
The risks of getting a costs order against me are higher than 0% but if I lose narrowly I won't be paying anything.
Edit:
Courts deal with contract law disputes all the time. It's their bread and butter, everyday, nothing special stuff.
Edit2:
To you below, citation needed
Edit: I'm somewhat mad that there's all these tools out there to solve the screeching about GPL violations and nobody seems to want to use them.
> The Copyright Claims Board (CCB) is available to resolve copyright disputes of a relatively low economic value and provides an efficient, less expensive alternative to federal court.
Basically everybody who knows enough to try, knows what the outcomes will tend to be.
It's not trivial in terms of big company bureaucracy - this request will have to go through so many levels of red tape that they (correctly) decided not complying to random people's requests is more profitable.
I'm sure if you actually sue them then they will comply right away, because at that point paying for some engineer's time to tar up the source tree and send it to you now becomes cheaper than lawyer time.
But their analysis is correct in that nobody will waste time/money suing to get what is effectively a stock kernel they can get from the official source anyway. Which is why these complaints are also a bit stupid - they're not asking for anything of value or using the GPL to advance software freedom by freeing up some valuable code, they're just wasting both theirs and others' time asking for something they can already download directly.
That is a gratuitous assumption. My experience is, as long as there is the smallest custom hardware, you will have to make some tweaks here and there.
> they're not asking for anything of value or using the GPL to advance software freedom by freeing up some valuable code, they're just wasting both theirs and others' time asking for something they can already download directly.
I'm sorry that the company which is making lots of money by using a copyrighted SW has to "waste" 200 dollars in some bureaucracy, printing and postage. But is the license of the SW they are using, and should abide by it.
How sure are you small tweaks create a derivative work? In your experience.
Using GPL software does not take away your rights under the law. As much as the angry FSF lawyers want you to believe - I can use any GPL software in any way I choose and have the affirmative defense of fair use for every single claim they throw at me.
Whether I lose or not depends on specific factors of my use - and I'm sorry but one comma isn't going to cut it.
Edit: A single comma will lose 100% of the time to a summary judgement via de minimis. That's just an incredible legal theory you have there and not something you should be spreading.
Edit2: The Beastie Boys famously won via de minimis at summary judgement for a 3 note sample. It matters not whether those 3 notes were GPL notes or not. It matters what the law is.
The communication between your phone/pump or glucose sensor/pump is encrypted now for all newer devices.
> Diabetic companies like Insulet have been very lax when it’s come to the hacking of their devices
Absolutely not true, not any more.
May I ask where did you get this info? And what “newer” means here?
I'm a medical device developer working on this exact problem (glucose control)
Surely there is a way to cheaply obtain bluetooth and a controller without saying "we'll just use this already existing hardware - that happens to be a whole-ass phone - because it's $5 from China"?
Kinda feels like that just screams data-stealing, regardless of where it was made.
Funny thing is that the newer Omnipod 5 from the same company works with regular phones now, but only in th US.
So, this companion device is kind of a thing that Insulet had to release. You'll see this with CGM's too -- there's a small companion device sold with the Dexcom G7 (the "controller"), even though everyone just uses their phone.
This is kind of a regulatory quirk; basically from the FDA's point of view you had to have a complete standalone system, that did not include the phone, in order to be able to prescribe it. I think they do not require companion devices any more, it's OK to release something that requires the user to have a phone.
"we plan on users having a phone to connect to it and use primarily. FDA requires a primary/backup. well it's already phone-controlled, go find a phone that works with it. needs to be cheap, cuz no one will really use it anyway"
That makes a little more sense. I was imagining the development process involving both devices, rather than one device first, then determining what the second would be later.
Thanks for the insight!
Insulin pumps are paired with glucose monitor. I bet it is handy to check glucose levels to make things are stable and correct if off.
It's part of the debate of whether (1) GPL is a contract, (2) GPL can be enforced by non-parties, (3) How Fair Use applies, (4) Methods to bully/shame companies to give up source code ...? (5) Who the actual parties involved are if the actual rights holder (Linux Kernel) tries to sue someone. (First Sale doctrine might apply).
Oh well. Big Corp doing what Big Corps do. Paying lip service to legal requirements, but reluctantly and with barriers that would no doubt take a lot of time and money to even try and break down.
"Why do you want the source code?! leave it alone! Don't touch it, is unsafe! Big Pharma companies know much better than you what they do!"
REALLY?! REALLY?!
I'm not saying, go changing the SW like crazy. Is clear it can kill you. But this "anybody who is not a mega pharma company is absolutely unable to do anything right, you will absolutely kill yourself if you look at the code" that is just... idk... so low.
It may be named hacker news, but boy, many people here are not remotely near what I would call a hacker...
You wouldn't download a CAR, would you? You wouldn't hack your own INSULIN pump, would you?
Face it: If it's GPL and vulnerable to interference, responsibility is squarely on the manufacturer and the fastest death-free way to prove it. If it's GPL and modified by the owner, fuck off.
How do they triage and decide what to pursue?
The dominant legal theory is that the GPL can only be enforced by the party holding the copyright. SFC's lawsuit against Vizio is strategically trying to establish precedent changing that; establishing that end-users are "third party beneficiaries" under the GPL, so others can enforce the GPL; but for now the copyright holder is the only one who can enforce it.
So the FSF could only take it up if the violation is on projects that do copyright-assignment to the FSF (i.e.: most GNU stuff). If you do find a violation of GNU stuff, the process is "email license-violation@gnu.org". I do not know what process Craig and Krzysztof use when triaging reports and deciding what to pursue.
Many Linux-kernel contributors (also, SFC member projects such as OpenWrt, Git, Qemu) have assigned their copyright to SFC or named SFC as their legal representative (also, SFC member projects; so SFC can take up something like this. Similarly, you can report violations to them by emailing compliance@sfconservancy.org (see https://sfconservancy.org/copyleft-compliance/help.html for more info).
Now, SFC is aware of more violations than they could ever possibly pursue, so they're strategic about pursuing ones that are high-impact. I'm not sure how they decide that. But I can say that medical devices are near-and-dear to them, between executive-director Karen Sandler's implanted defibrillator and policy-fellow Bradley Kühn's blood glucose monitor.
Disgusting is not respecting the producers who put together the device that wouldn’t exist otherwise, leaving thousands of people in pain or death.
What's "illegal" about these products?
> send the importer a big fine.
And that gets paid?
> This is already an established process.
And has it ever been used for /civil/ software GPL violations?