said by B04:I understand; that's well written and sounds well-meaning, but isn't it just a bit ridiculous? The GPL is "holding back" these projects because the stubborn writers of the code YOU WANT TO SELL won't let you do it? But... they have no obligation to let you sell their code on
your terms! You're perfectly free to seek separate alternative licenses from those developers or to seek alternatives, as you've done.
Why aren't you just as mad at all the OTHER developers (you know, your closed-source competitors who write software that competes with yours) for not letting you freely redistribute /resell THEIR code on your terms? Why be angry only with GPL developers?
I understand your point, but it's just backwards. It's only "holding back" projects that seek to close up their sources, like your own. Agreed, I suppose that much is arguably "viral".
That said, I'm certainly glad you're respecting the license anyhow!
Lesser companies don't even think twice.
-- B
P.S. I'd point out how funny the part about "damn sure not going to allow anyone to redistribute our code" is for someone who wants to take advantage of redistributed "Free" (GPL) software, but I think it's self-apparent...
I don't know where you came up with anybody being "mad" at authors of GPL applications. I don't hate the people, I dislike the license. I'm sure I may offend a lot of people but I see the GPL as a "hippie" license with the bravado of "hey may, everything should be free man".
It hinders commercial software development on two fronts, one, a commercial software company that doesn't release source code for trade-secret reasons can't use it and two, even if a company agreed to release the source, they can't charge for their own improvements.
If you look at the BSD community you will find a different story. Software is truly free and open-source. Companies can improve it, resell it for profit whether the source is re-released or not. The BEST example ever of this is Apple and OS X. Apple was able to take the BSD operating system and use it under the hood and not be worried by GPL clauses. They also in turn were able to recontribute back to the base BSD operating system teams without fear of GPL licensing war-mongers.
The bottom line is this, if you want to give it away, give it away and let it be free. Don't be anti-greedy with the "I don't want to sell so dammit, nobody else can make any money either, even if they improve it." In general I'm sure most GPL authors don't really care, they just end up with that license because it's trendy and more than likely they have something in there code that is GPL licensed.
Honestly, as my argument is what it is I am thankful for tools like GNU's compiler and the various Linux flavors. And if the authors only thought they would be successful under the GPL, so be it. On that note I should say that I'm a NetBSD user/supporter and eventual developer if ever have the time. That said, any code I work on will either be BSD or commercially licensed. If it's going to be free, it's going to be free.