Dealing With a GPL Violation? 204
Sortova writes "For many years now I've been maintaining OpenNMS, a free and open source network management framework published under the GPL. A couple of years ago it came to our attention that a company called Cittio was using OpenNMS as part of their proprietary and commercial network management application. I talked with Jamie Lerner, the Cittio founder, and he assured me that Cittio was abiding by the GPL. However, we were recently contacted by a potential client who was also considering Cittio's Watchtower, and it appears that they are not disclosing that they are using GPL'd code or at least not in the clear and concise fashion required by the GPL, including the offer of source code for all of the code they are including and any changes being made to that code. Since the copyright for OpenNMS is held by a number of commercial companies, the Software Freedom Law Center is not able to help us defend or even investigate a potential violation. I was curious if anyone here on Slashdot had experienced anything similar or has any advice?"
Re:Bye bye my application (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Bye bye my application (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Do a little digging yourself, get a lawyer (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:You've achieved your desired goal (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:You don't know they are in violation (Score:3, Interesting)
On a vaguely related note, if it turns out that this company is purely on the straight and level with regard to the GPL and other OSS licenses, I'd like to mention that I'm very pleased to see this kind of thing. The more exposure OSS gets, the better; some purists might complain about people who don't make their modifications open to literally everybody, but overall I believe commercial interest in (and, hopefully, support of) OSS projects is a good thing.
Re:You don't know they are in violation (Score:3, Interesting)
"So what's all this then? [cittio.com]"
Well, that link says they're running OpenNMS 1.0.2, which, given the questions Cittio employees have asked on the OpenNMS mailing lists in the past, seems very unlikely (although technically possible). If they *are* using 1.0.2, they very likely *have* made modifications, 'cause that code has plenty of bugs that have been fixed in later OpenNMS releases. ;)
One thing that Tarus didn't really mention is that we (The OpenNMS Group) have had a few folks come to us wanting quotes to compare us to Cittio, and they've been rather surprised that Cittio is in fact already using OpenNMS under the covers. The problem is not with them using OpenNMS, OpenNMS is all about sticking not only to the letter but also the spirit of the GPL, and they can do whatever they want with it as long as they're complying with the distribution requirements of the license. The problem is whether Cittio *is* upholding their side of the GPL, and it's unclear whether they are -- and there are some signs that they might not be.
As for them not having to offer the source until they distribute the software, yes, that's true, but from what we've heard from existing Cittio customers, that is not being made clear to them. Not only that, but while the wording of the GPL may not make it obvious, the FAQ does [gnu.org]:
It seems likely that they've incorporated OpenNMS into their software at a lower-level than just screen-scraping it's output and stuffing it into their own UI. At that point, they should be prepared to provide the modified OpenNMS source to their customers. Not only that, but considering how tough companies are on open-source developers accidentally "tainting" open-source code with IP from their closed-source employers, it's more than a tad annoying that many closed-source companies taking advantage of open-source software are happy to use it, but ignore the spirit of sharing that is part of being in the community. "We won't say anything, but if you do ask us for the source, we'll fax it to you." ;)
Again, all this is unproven, and that's part of the reason Tarus posted, the question is -- what's the next step?
Re:You've achieved your desired goal (Score:3, Interesting)
The problem with being held very highly by some folks is that if some day they decide they disagree with me, I immediately go to the opposite pole and they consider me to be evil incarnate. Fortunately, most of them grow up eventually. I'd be most happy to be accepted as an often-knowledgable human being with faults. My notoriety is important, though, because it helps me to get people to listen about issues that are important to us.
I can live with Slashdot moderation. What I do have a problem with is that I can't get my damn submissions approved when they're important. Slashdot actually rejected a submission on the California "Open Voting" bill.
Bruce