On Mon, Nov 3, 2008 at 8:29 AM, Monty J. Harder <mjharder@gmail.com> wrote:
On Sun, Nov 2, 2008 at 11:25 PM, Jeffrey Watts <jeffrey.w.watts@gmail.com> wrote:
I appreciate your position, but you have to realize that if you're using CentOS, you're not using it for the GPLed parts.  You're using it because Red Hat built and regression tested an extremely stable distribution.  You're using it because Red Hat spent the time and money to make third party apps like Oracle run well on it.  You're using it because they took the time to integrate things like SELinux.


Fundamentally, I do not see any theory of morality that makes CentOS immoral while still keeping Red Hat itself moral. 

CentOS isn't providing any value-add.  They simply strip branding and call it their own.  That's not adhering to the spirit of the GPL, the idea that you take someone else's software, add value, and release that value into the wild.  The only "value" they add is providing a way to circumvent Red Hat's distribution model for their binaries.

To use a car analogy (albiet a weak one), if I take a Toyota and rip off all the Toyota branding and glue on Honda branding, that's immoral.  If I take a Toyota and soup up the engine, put in a different interior, and upgrade the stereo, then glue on my Honda branding, that's moral.

The GPL is intended to ensure that if you enhance software (bug fixes, security fixes, feature enhancements, etc) you must provide the source for those when you give your program to the community.  It's not intended to allow you to re-brand software and call it your own.

Personally, I'm up in the air about CentOS.  But I certainly see Jeffrey's points.

--
Chris