What good is VNC's GPL?

[Mark Jacobs]

Mike Miller wrote:

> On Thu, 7 Apr 2005, Steve Bostedor wrote:
>
>> This is all just fantasy talk, anyways.  We KNOW that theirs is a 
>> modified VNC because they spell it out on their website.  Who cares, 
>> I guess.  It looks like everyone's doing it.  Integrity and doing the 
>> right thing just doesn't matter for anything these days, I guess.  
>> Kiss the GPL good-bye on this one.
>
>
> What did they do that was wrong.  They say that their software uses 
> VNC. That's not wrong.  They sell it for money -- also not wrong.  
> I'll sell you a copy of Xvnc for $500 and I'll call it "Mike's VNC."  
> That's not wrong (because I'll include the source code, copyright, 
> GPL, etc.).  Are they violating the GPL, or are we just imagining that 
> they must be violating the GPL?

Has anyone managed to get the source code off of these guys? If not, 
*that* is what they are doing wrong, just like SmartCode would not give 
out their source code, even though it should be exactly the same as the 
code that you can request from Wez himself. GPL means you must release 
the source on request, otherwise you cannot claim it is GPL. If you 
cannot claim it is GPL, then you cannot use that GPL source code in your 
product. Therefore, it is clear-cut, and there is no ambiguity here. 
Both companies *owe* us the source code, and we should be able to email 
them once, and get it.

As for a hall of infamy, I reckon it would be fun, but also libellous 
unless undertaken wrt to the written letter of GPL law.

-- 
Mark Jacobs
http://www.dkcomputing.co.uk