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August 2012

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Fri, 31 Aug 2012 20:59:26 +0900
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The intel license is a license on the binary. From my understanding the 
GPL covers both. The GPL prohibits stacking any additional terms that 
limit *any* use, and that would include disassembly. Item 3 of GPLv3 
"Protecting Users' Legal Rights From Anti-Circumvention Law" is 
something else I would want to look into if I were doing this.

So I wouldn't say this is entirely straight forward. It gray enough that 
I'd want a green light from Intel and an explanation. For example, at 
what point does examination of the stack become prohibited "reverse 
engineering" or "disassembly"? To a developer these are usually 
distinct, but for a security researcher they might be viewed as 
different names for the same activity (and some closed-source licenses 
include a (often sketchy) exception for security research purposes, and 
some jurisdictions exempt this use on their own).

It would be interesting to see what the response to this kind of 
question would be on the Fedora-legal list. I wouldn't be surprised if 
it has already been discussed.

On 08/31/2012 06:45 PM, Rich wrote:
> Actually, it might not.
>
> GPL(v2, at least) prevents you from refusing to distribute source to
> your binaries or enforcing any license restrictions beyond the GPL on
> the source.
>
> I don't see, at a reading, any clauses on the binary.
>
> - Rich
>
> On Fri, Aug 31, 2012 at 5:41 AM, Rich<[log in to unmask]>  wrote:
>> It would certainly block GPL software, I believe, but not, by far, everything.
>>
>>> I think item (iv) is the blocker, not the trade name issue.
>>>
>>> I'm not a lawyer, but labeling a free (as in beer) distributable file
>>> *-intel.rpm would probably not meet the definition of "market your product".
>>> Anyway, getting their permission in writing could be resolved by getting
>>> their permission in writing (probably not impossible).
>>>
>>> The problem would come with item (iv) where they place a use restriction (as
>>> in restriction on freedom) on the distributable that is in conflict with the
>>> Open Source Definition: "shall use a license agreement that prohibits
>>> disassembly and reverse engineering of the distributables".
>>>
>>> Unaltered that would block distribution of any project under any open source
>>> license I can think of.

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