65-520: LibrePlanet (literally, "Free Planet") is a community project created and supported by the Free Software Foundation . Its objective is the promotion of free software around the world by bringing every year an international conference to local communities and organizations. The project was born in 2006, at a gathering of members associated with the Free Software Foundation and the will to organize into geographical groups. The wiki serves as
130-406: A Jerry Springer kind of way. White trash battling it out in public, throwing chairs at each other. SCO crying about IBM's other women. ... Fairly entertaining. The Inquirer reported on June 15, 2003, that an unnamed Linux kernel programmer has written to SCO, threatening action based on their distribution of a Linux distribution that, according to their own claims, contains code not licensed under
195-482: A web store . FSF offers speakers and seminars for pay, and all FSF projects accept donations. Revenues fund free-software programs and campaigns, while cash is invested conservatively in socially responsible investing . The financial strategy is designed to maintain the Foundation's long-term future through economic stability. The FSF is a tax-exempt organization and posts annual IRS Form 990 filings online. Through
260-497: A "Respects Your Freedom" (RYF) hardware certification program. To be granted certification, a product must use 100% Free Software, allow user installation of modified software, be free of backdoors and conform with several other requirements. The FSF's board of directors includes professors at leading universities, senior engineers, and founders. Current board members are: Previous board members include: Executive directors include: The FSF Articles of Organization state that
325-511: A $ 1 billion lawsuit in the United States against IBM for allegedly "devaluing" its version of the UNIX operating system. SCO retained Boies Schiller & Flexner for this, and related subsequent litigation. The amount of alleged damages was later increased to $ 3 billion, and then $ 5 billion. SCO claimed that IBM had, without authorization, contributed SCO's intellectual property to the codebase of
390-539: A Boston intellectual property law firm, even went so far as to say "Attacks on the GPL are far-fetched and a little bit desperate". Stacey Quandt, principal analyst at Quandt Analytics, remarked, "SCO's prior claim that the GPL was unconstitutional was equivalent to Microsoft's claims about open source being un-American—totally ridiculous.". Professor Eben Moglen, on leave from the Columbia University law faculty for
455-586: A Linux integrator, reported on May 30, 2003, it was granted an injunction by a Bremen court under German competition law that prohibits the SCO Group's German division from claiming that Linux contains illegally obtained SCO intellectual property. If the SCO Group continued to express this position, they would have to pay a fine of € 250,000. A similar injunction was sought around the same time in Poland . On July 23, 2003, Open Source Victoria announced that it had filed
520-546: A certain period of its litigation against IBM, SCO alleged that the GPL violates the United States Constitution . This allegation was dropped however from SCO's claims in April 2004 in "SCO's Answer to IBM's Second Amended Counterclaims". SCO originally based its views on the following considerations: Section 8 of Article One of the United States Constitution states that [ Congress shall have power] to promote
585-511: A complaint with the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission , "asking the ACCC to investigate the SCO Group's activities in light of their unsubstantiated claims and their extortive legal threats for money against possibly hundreds of thousands of Australians". SCO Group then filed subpoenas for Richard Stallman and Linus Torvalds on November 13, 2003. Within a few months of
650-617: A free smartphone operating system and creating replacements for Skype and Siri . Previous projects highlighted as needing work included the Free Java implementations , GNU Classpath , and GNU Compiler for Java , which ensure compatibility for the Java part of OpenOffice.org , and the GNOME desktop environment (see Java: Licensing ). The effort has been criticized by Michael Larabel for either not instigating active development or for being slow at
715-545: A lawsuit against Cisco for using GPL-licensed components shipped with Linksys products. Cisco was notified of the licensing issue in 2003 but Cisco repeatedly disregarded its obligations under the GPL. In May 2009, Cisco and FSF reached settlement under which Cisco agreed to make a monetary donation to the FSF and appoint a Free Software Director to conduct continuous reviews of the company's license compliance practices. In September 2019, Richard Stallman resigned as president of
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#1732848795797780-581: Is a civil lawsuit in the United States District Court of Utah . The SCO Group asserted that there are legal uncertainties regarding the use of the Linux operating system due to alleged violations of IBM 's Unix licenses in the development of Linux code at IBM . The lawsuit was filed in 2003, it has lingered on through the bankruptcy of SCO Group and the adverse result in SCO v. Novell , and
845-569: Is a fundamental difference between speaking out against policies or actions and smear campaigns", and "that if one is taking an ethical position, it is justified, and often necessary, to not only speak about the benefits of freedom but against acts of dispossession and disenfranchisement." In 2009, a license update of LibDWG/ LibreDWG to version 3 of the GNU GPL made it impossible for the free software projects LibreCAD and FreeCAD to use LibreDWG legally. Many projects voiced their unhappiness about
910-473: Is a list of software packages that have been verified as free software. Each package entry contains up to 47 pieces of information such as the project's homepage, developers, programming language, etc. The goals are to provide a search engine for free software, and to provide a cross-reference for users to check if a package has been verified as being free software. The FSF has received a small amount of funding from UNESCO for this project. FSF maintains many of
975-474: Is solicited. Eben Moglen and Dan Ravicher previously served individually as pro bono legal counsel to the FSF. After forming the Software Freedom Law Center , Eben Moglen continued to serve as the FSF's general counsel until 2016. Most of the FSF funding comes from patrons and members. Revenue streams also come from free-software-related compliance labs, job postings, published works, and
1040-474: The GNU Project and its employees and volunteers have mostly worked on legal and structural issues for the free software movement and the free software community . Consistent with its goals, the FSF aims to use only free software on its own computers. The Free Software Foundation was founded in 1985 as a non-profit corporation supporting free software development. It continued existing GNU projects such as
1105-577: The Open Source Development Labs released a position paper on the ongoing conflict, written by the FSF's Eben Moglen. A number of Linux supporters have characterized SCO's actions as an attempt to create fear, uncertainty and doubt about Linux. Many believe that SCO's aim is to be bought out by IBM. Others have pointed to Microsoft 's subsequent licensing of the SCO source code as a possible quid pro quo for SCO's action. Univention GmbH ,
1170-617: The SCO v. Novell case, ruled that Novell, not the SCO Group, is the rightful owner of the copyrights covering the Unix operating system. The court also ruled that "SCO is obligated to recognize Novell's waiver of SCO's claims against IBM and Sequent". After the ruling Novell announced they have no interest in suing people over Unix and stated "We don't believe there is Unix in Linux". In an order entered on September 21, 2007, Judge Kimball administratively closed
1235-771: The SVR4 code, but the SVR4 code, plus any derivative works made from that code, must be held confidential by IBM. According to IBM's interpretation of the contract, and the interpretation published by AT&T in their "$ echo" newsletter in 1985, "derivative works" means any works containing SVR4 code. But according to SCO's interpretation, "derivative works" also includes any code built on top of SVR4, even if that does not contain, or even never contained, any SVR4 code. Thus, according to SCO, any AIX operating system code that IBM developed must be kept confidential, even if it contains nothing from SVR4. The lawsuit caused moral indignation and outrage in
1300-508: The board of directors are elected. The bylaws say who can vote for them. The board can grant powers to the Voting Membership. At any given time, there are usually around a dozen employees. Most, but not all, worked at the FSF headquarters in Boston, Massachusetts until August 2024 when the FSF closed its offices and switched to remote work. On November 25, 2002, the FSF launched
1365-526: The free software and open source communities , who consider SCO's claims to be without merit and even cynically dishonest. Open source advocates' arguments include: SCO and its officers have been the subject of much criticism by the free software community, some of whom have stated that SCO's behavior may amount to illegal conduct. SEC filings show that senior SCO executives dumped their personal holdings in SCO shortly after counter-suits were filed by IBM and Red Hat. SCO Group's CEO Darl McBride has been
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#17328487957971430-512: The free software community 's attention". The FSF considers these projects "important because computer users are continually being seduced into using non-free software , because there is no adequate free replacement." As of 2021, high-priority tasks include reverse engineering proprietary firmware, reversible debugging in GNU Debugger ; developing automatic transcription and video editing software, Coreboot , drivers for network routers ,
1495-462: The free software movement , with the organization's preference for software being distributed under copyleft ("share alike") terms, such as with its own GNU General Public License . The FSF was incorporated in Boston, Massachusetts , United States, where it is also based. From its founding until the mid-1990s, FSF's funds were mostly used to employ software developers to write free software for
1560-663: The open source , Unix-like Linux operating system. In May 2003, SCO Group sent letters to members of the Fortune 1000 and Global 500 companies warning them of the possibility of liability if they use Linux. The claims and counter-claims made by both sides then escalated, with both IBM and Linux distributor Red Hat starting legal action against SCO, SCO threatening Linux users who do not take out SCO UNIX licenses , and SCO suing Novell (see also SCO-Linux controversies ), AutoZone and DaimlerChrysler . On September 30, 2003, Judge Kimball (the presiding federal district judge ) granted
1625-462: The Advancement of Free Software " and " Free Software Award for Projects of Social Benefit " The LibrePlanet wiki organizes FSF members into regional groups in order to promote free software activism against digital restrictions management and other issues promoted by the FSF. The FSF maintains a list of "high-priority projects" to which the Foundation claims that "there is a vital need to draw
1690-546: The FSF Associate Membership program for individuals. Bradley M. Kuhn (FSF executive director, 2001–2005) launched the program and also signed up as the first Associate Member Associate members are primarily an honorary and funding support role. In 2023, associate members gained the ability to make board nominations, along with FSF staff and FSF voting members. There is also an annual meeting of FSF members, usually during lunch at LibrePlanet, in which feedback for FSF
1755-534: The FSF after pressure from journalists and members of the open source community in response to him making controversial comments in defense of Marvin Minsky on Jeffrey Epstein 's sex trafficking scandal. Nevertheless, Stallman remained head of the GNU Project and in 2021, he returned to the FSF board of directors. The original purpose of the FSF was to promote the ideals of free software. The organization envisaged
1820-526: The FSF and others have re-termed "digital restrictions management", as part of its effort to highlight technologies that are "designed to take away and limit your rights", ) and user interface copyright. Since 2012, Defective by Design is an FSF-initiated campaign against DRM. It also has a campaign to promote Ogg + Vorbis , a free alternative to proprietary formats like AAC and MQA . FSF also sponsors free software projects it deems "high-priority". " Outstanding new Free Software contributor ", " Award for
1885-834: The GNU operating system as an example of this. The GNU General Public License (GPL) is a widely used license for free software projects. The current version (version 3) was released in June 2007. The FSF has also published the GNU Lesser General Public License (LGPL), the GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL), and the GNU Affero General Public License (AGPL). The FSF's publishing department, responsible for "publishing affordable books on computer science using freely distributable licenses." This
1950-401: The GPL. According to the letter reproduced there, the programmer claimed that SCO's doing so was an infringement of his own copyright. SCO's response to this letter is not known. In an interview on June 23, 2003, Torvalds responded to SCO's allegation that Linux development had no process for vetting kernel contributions: I allege that SCO is full of it, and that the Linux process is already
2015-537: The GPLv3 license selection for LibreDWG, such as FreeCAD , LibreCAD , Assimp , and Blender . Some suggested the selection of a license with a broader license compatibility , for instance the MIT , BSD , or LGPL 2.1. A request went to the FSF to relicense GNU LibreDWG as GPLv2, which was rejected in 2012. SCO v. IBM SCO Group, Inc. v. International Business Machines Corp. , commonly abbreviated as SCO v. IBM ,
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2080-590: The SCO Group's request for a delay until February 4, 2004, "to file any amended pleadings or add parties to this action". The schedule was amended again on July 1, 2005. In December 2006 the trial date was vacated pending the resolution of SCO's litigation with Novell, all parties agreeing that SCO v. Novell would resolve issues relating to SCO v. IBM . In an "Order Granting in Part IBM's Motion to Limit SCO's Claims" dated June 28, 2006, Judge Brooke Wells (the federal magistrate judge presiding over discovery aspects of
2145-431: The SCO litigation on a daily basis, and became a voice for the community to express its views of SCO's claims, as well as being an experiment in applying Open Source principles to legal research. The SCO Group has singled the site out as a particular thorn in its side. On May 30, 2003, Linus Torvalds , developer of the Linux kernel, was quoted as saying, regarding the case: Quite frankly, I found it mostly interesting in
2210-617: The Supreme Court refused to do in Eldred v. Ashcroft , and copyright holders' discretion over the enjoyment of their exclusive rights. The GPL specifically prohibits, in section 7, distribution of software in jurisdictions where the laws are incompatible with the GPL, so a ruling that upheld SCO's constitutional argument would prevent distribution of Linux (and other copylefted software) in the United States. Other commentators disagree however. One such commentator, Tom Carey, partner and chairman of
2275-516: The adoption and promotion of free software. From 2003 to 2005, FSF held legal seminars to explain the GPL and the surrounding law. Usually taught by Bradley M. Kuhn and Daniel Ravicher , these seminars offered CLE credit and were the first effort to give formal legal education on the GPL. In 2007, the FSF published the third version of the GNU General Public License after significant outside input. In December 2008, FSF filed
2340-485: The allegedly infringing code would make up about 0.001% of the total code of a typical Linux installation. SCO has since upwardly revised this figure to over a million lines of code, however. SCO's major claims have now been reported as relating to the following components of the Linux kernel: These claims flow from the accusation of breach of contract. The contract between IBM and AT&T Corporation (to which SCO claims to be successor in interest) allows IBM to use
2405-547: The case of SCO v. IBM due to SCO filing for bankruptcy on September 14, 2007. This means that all action in SCO v. IBM is stayed until SCO emerges from bankruptcy proceedings. If and when it does, the case SCO v. IBM will resume where it left off. On August 24, 2009, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit reversed the portion of the August 10, 2007 district court summary judgment in SCO v. Novell that Novell owned
2470-414: The case) barred SCO from asserting 187 of the 298 allegedly misused items that IBM had moved to exclude from the lawsuit for lack of specificity, stating "many of SCO's arguments and much of Mr. Rochkind's declaration miss the mark", and comparing SCO's tactics with those of an officer who accuses a citizen of theft, but will not disclose what the citizen is accused of stealing. "Certainly if an individual
2535-630: The complaint again, dropping the trade secrets claim, but added the following: SCO's claims in press releases and interviews have changed repeatedly as the affair has progressed. SCO has also both claimed and denied that the alleged copyright violations involved the Linux kernel . Computerworld reported Chris Sontag of SCO as saying: It's very extensive. It is many different sections of code ranging from five to ten to fifteen lines of code in multiple places that are of issue, up to large blocks of code that have been inappropriately copied into Linux in violation of our source-code licensing contract. That's in
2600-540: The copyright to Unix. As a result, SCO was permitted to pursue its claim of ownership of the Unix copyrights at trial. On March 30, 2010, the jury returned a verdict in SCO v. Novell , finding that Novell owns the copyrights. SCO's lawsuit has been consistent only in its claim of breach of contract (since the abandonment in early 2004 of its claim of misappropriation of trade secrets ). SCO's initial claims were: On July 22, 2003, SCO amended its complaint. It added two new claims: On February 27, 2004, SCO amended
2665-411: The developers of that operating system, the SCO Group then announced on May 14, 2003, that they would no longer distribute Linux. According to a press release, SCO said that it would "continue to support existing SCO Linux and Caldera OpenLinux customers and hold them harmless from any SCO intellectual property issues regarding SCO Linux and Caldera OpenLinux products". SCO currently claims: During
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2730-587: The distinction between expression and idea." Novell entered the controversy by publishing on May 28, 2003, a press release concerning the SCO Group 's ownership of UNIX . "To Novell's knowledge, the 1995 agreement governing SCO's purchase of UNIX from Novell does not convey to SCO the associated copyrights," a letter to the SCO Group's CEO Darl McBride said in part. "We believe it unlikely that SCO can demonstrate that it has any ownership interest whatsoever in those copyrights. Apparently you share this view, since over
2795-541: The documents that define the free software movement. FSF hosts software development projects on its Savannah website. An abbreviation for "Hardware-Node", the h-node website lists hardware and device drivers that have been verified as compatible with free software. It is user-edited and volunteer supported with hardware entries tested by users before publication. FSF sponsors a number of campaigns against what it perceives as dangers to software freedom, including software patents , digital rights management (which
2860-404: The filing of the lawsuit, Eben Moglen, the Free Software Foundation 's legal counsel at the time, stated that SCO's suit should not concern Linux users other than IBM. In an interview with internetnews.com , he was reported as saying: There is absolute difficulty with this line of argument which ought to make everybody in the world aware that the letters that SCO has put out can be safely put in
2925-417: The holder of these copyrights, it has authority to enforce the copyleft requirements of the GNU General Public License (GPL) when copyright infringement occurs. From 1991 until 2001, GPL enforcement was done informally, usually by Stallman himself, often with assistance from FSF's lawyer, Eben Moglen . Typically, GPL violations during this time were cleared up by short email exchanges between Stallman and
2990-459: The judge dismissed SCO's suit against IBM with prejudice . SCO filed an appeal later that month. In February 2018, as a result of the appeal and the case being partially remanded to the circuit court, the parties restated their remaining claims and provided a plan to move toward final judgement. In 2021, the case finally ended in a settlement. On March 6, 2003, the SCO Group (formerly known as Caldera International and Caldera Systems ) filed
3055-969: The kernel itself, so it is significant. It is not a line or two here or there. It was quite a surprise for us. SCO refuses to allow access to the samples of code containing the alleged copyright violations except under a non-disclosure agreement (NDA). SCO's NDA would not only require that the signer keep confidential which lines of code SCO contested, but would also require that they hold confidential any information SCO told them, even if they already knew that information before being informed of it by SCO; all Linux kernel developers have considered this to be far too restrictive, so none of them have signed it. However, at SCO's annual reseller's convention in August 2003, they revealed two short sections of code they alleged were copyright violations, and images of Darl McBride's presentation of this code were soon after published on German computer magazine publisher Heinz Heise 's website. On May 30, 2003, SCO Group's CEO Darl McBride
3120-508: The last few months you have repeatedly asked Novell to transfer the copyrights to SCO, requests that Novell has rejected." SCO later claimed to have discovered an amendment to their contract with Novell transferring partial ownership to SCO. Novell stated that the amendment "appears to bear a valid Novell signature, and the language, though convoluted, seems to support SCO's claim that ownership of some copyrights for Unix did transfer to SCO"; Novell also said that it could not find its own copy of
3185-586: The license itself. Linus Torvalds has criticized FSF for using GPLv3 as a weapon in the fight against DRM. Torvalds argues that the issue of DRM and that of a software license should be treated as two separate issues. On June 16, 2010, Joe Brockmeier, a journalist at Linux Magazine , criticized the Defective by Design campaign by the FSF as "negative" and "juvenile" and not being adequate for providing users with "credible alternatives" to proprietary software. FSF responded to this criticism by saying "that there
3250-458: The most transparent process in the whole industry. Let's face it, nobody else even comes close to being as good at showing the evolution and source of every single line of code out there. On June 27, 2003, Eben Moglen , the counsel for the Free Software Foundation , released a more complete statement regarding the SCO lawsuit. In this statement, he reiterates many of the points made above, and states that: As to its trade secret claims, which are
3315-447: The only claims actually made in the lawsuit against IBM, there remains the simple fact that SCO has for years distributed copies of the kernel, Linux, as part of GNU/Linux free software systems. [...] There is simply no legal basis on which SCO can claim trade secret liability in others for material it widely and commercially published itself under a license that specifically permitted unrestricted copying and distribution. On July 31, 2003,
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#17328487957973380-400: The primary portal for people who want to become involved in free software activism in local, grassroots modes of cooperation. The conference is organized annually by the Free Software Foundation in or around Boston, Massachusetts and staffed by a mixture of foundation staff and community volunteers. The conference replaces and incorporates the FSF annual members meeting which ran around
3445-403: The progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries. Since the GNU General Public License for the most part disclaims exclusive rights, SCO claimed that its use violates this clause. SCO's argument asks the court to limit both Congress's discretion in implementing the copyright clause, which
3510-476: The sale of manuals and tapes , and employed developers of the free software system. Since then, it has continued these activities, as well as advocating for the free software movement. The FSF is also the steward of several free software licenses, meaning it publishes them and has the ability to make revisions as needed. The FSF holds the copyrights on many pieces of the GNU system, such as GNU Compiler Collection . As
3575-564: The same time each year. Each conference has its own theme and a website. The event typically includes a speech from FSF president, Richard Stallman and FSF executive director John Sullivan , the Free Software awards well as members of the wider free software community and the free software awards ceremony Free Software Foundation The Free Software Foundation ( FSF ) is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization founded by Richard Stallman on October 4, 1985. The organisation supports
3640-559: The subject of particular criticism, because of his extreme statements to the press. On March 10, 2003, the Open Source Initiative (OSI) released a position paper on the SCO v. IBM complaint, written by Eric S. Raymond , president of the OSI and author of The Cathedral and the Bazaar . On May 16, 2003, Groklaw , a website founded by journalist/paralegal Pamela Jones , began covering
3705-550: The violator. In the interest of promoting copyleft assertiveness by software companies to the level that the FSF was already doing, in 2004 Harald Welte launched gpl-violations.org . In late 2001, Bradley M. Kuhn (then executive director), with the assistance of Moglen, David Turner, and Peter T. Brown , formalized these efforts into FSF's GPL Compliance Labs. From 2002–2004, high-profile GPL enforcement cases, such as those against Linksys and OpenTV, became frequent. GPL enforcement and educational campaigns on GPL compliance
3770-484: The wastebasket... From the moment that SCO distributed that code under the GNU General Public License, they would have given everybody in the world the right to copy, modify and distribute that code freely... From the moment SCO distributed the Linux kernel under GPL, they licensed the use. Always. That's what our license says. Apparently noticing the incongruity of their selling a Linux distribution while suing IBM for stealing their intellectual property and giving it to
3835-410: The work being done, even after certain projects were added to the list. The FSF maintains a list of approved Linux operating systems that maintain free software by default: The project also maintains a list of operating systems that are not versions of the GNU system: The following are previously endorsed operating systems that are no longer actively maintained : Since 2012, the FSF maintains
3900-674: The year 2006–2007, speaking as counsel to the Free Software Foundation (FSF) who is responsible for drafting the GPL, also takes this view. He says, "I believe the constitutionality attack on the GPL is not a tenable legal argument but is rather a public relations argument." In a talk at Harvard in February, he addressed the issue of constitutionality by referring to Congress' recent extension of copyright term limits. "It turns out that there's no such thing as an unconstitutional copyright rule," he said, "if Congress passes it, and if it observes
3965-406: The years the FSF has had its postal address, and until August 31st 2024 when going all remote its physical headquarters, at different locations in Boston , Massachusetts , USA , as indicated in the table below. As the GNU GPL v2 included the FSF's postal address in one of the first lines of the introduction and the source code license notice template every change of address also caused updates to
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#17328487957974030-422: Was a major focus of the FSF's efforts during this period. In March 2003, SCO filed suit against IBM alleging that IBM's contributions to various free software, including FSF's GNU, violated SCO's rights. While FSF was never a party to the lawsuit, FSF was subpoenaed on November 5, 2003. During 2003 and 2004, FSF put substantial advocacy effort into responding to the lawsuit and quelling its negative impact on
4095-489: Was quoted as saying that the Linux kernel contained "hundreds of lines" of code from SCO's version of UNIX, and that SCO would reveal the code to other companies under NDA in July. To put this into context, David Wheeler's SLOCCount estimates the size of the Linux 2.4.2 kernel as 2,440,919 source lines of code out of over 30 million physical source lines of code for a typical Linux distribution. Therefore, as per SCO's own estimate,
4160-469: Was reopened for continued litigation by order of a new judge on June 14, 2013. Pursuant to the court order reopening the case, an IBM Motion for Summary Judgment was filed based upon the results of the Novell decision. On December 15, 2014, the judge granted most of IBM's motion, thereby narrowing the scope of the case, which remained open. On March 1, 2016, following a ruling against the last remaining claims,
4225-449: Was stopped and accused of shoplifting after walking out of Neiman Marcus , they would expect to be eventually told what they allegedly stole. It would be absurd for an officer to tell the accused that 'you know what you stole I'm not telling.' Or, to simply hand the accused individual a catalog of Neiman Marcus' entire inventory and say 'it's in there somewhere, you figure it out.'" On August 10, 2007, Judge Kimball, who also presides over
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