[LAD] GPL Violation Alert! - I talked with the President of Beat Kangz Today

[Sampo Savolainen]

Quoting "alex stone" <compose59 at gmail.com>:

> Interesting stuff, espcially when you consider that but a week or 2
> ago, another chap from a university, who was unaware of the
> implications of the GPL, got nailed for not releasing his code as per
> a strict definition of the GPL, and took a lot of sustained abuse for
> it as a result. He's moved quickly to remedy this and asked for help,
> not wanting to let ignorance of the facts get in the way of doing the
> right thing.

You are making the wrongful assumption that the LAD list speaks with  
one voice. The impro-visor thread proved that beyond any doubt. There  
was anger, but also a lot of sympathy towards the said professor.


I got a very curtious email from the president of Beat Kangz last  
night. They are offering to put up credits and are hinting towards  
giving donations to ladspa developers. This is probably because they  
want to smooch over this nasty "detail" and they probably feel this  
could be a mutually beneficial relationship. They are also offering a  
free copy of their software.

I feel a bit ambivalent about the violation. The ladspa interface  
should protect a host from the virality of a GPL'd plugin. This means  
that the host code can be as proprietary as the copyright holder  
wants. Fact is though that they do distribute GPL'd plugins. I am  
sympathetic to this decision as most normal users want things to work  
out of the box without a horde of installers. I'm also a bit flattered  
that they chose my limiter for their software. But they should give me  
credit for it. The fact that they didn't do this before they were  
alerted to it, speaks for how businesses often work.

To sum up how I see it, the violation is only skin deep: They are not  
giving plugin authors credit and they should also note that their  
application comes bundled with GPL'd software.

So, at least at the moment I'm leaning towards accepting the offered  
solution to the violation. Any thoughts?


  Sampo