Having an liberally licensed code-base with make it very easy for entities to publish a benign version on github, and then deploy an "enhanced" version on the real hardware, cryptographiclly signed, and not dumpable. They'll find something, that can support the argument, that not all functionality can be open-sourced, and that is why the published binary will never have the same checksum as something you have compiled from the public sources.

From my comment history you will see I am pretty much into commercial and dual licensing, so I do agree with your point, however kind of feels like the way copyleft licenses have been managed has brought us back to the commercial licenses with source code, just under a different name to make them more appealing to younger generations.

Hi, thanks for replying!

> the way copyleft licenses have been managed has brought us back to the commercial licenses with source code, just under a different name to make them more appealing to younger generations.

I think, I'm following along (&agree), but to be sure, could you perhaps elaborate a bit on that? (Also for other? readers)

Basically Linux kernel, GNU utilities and GCC are the only projects left with a copyleft license, almost everyone else migrated to non-copyleft licenses in the context of making money with some form of open source.

And not everything gets upstream, in name of keeping the main business at the company's soul, for example those optimizations used by clang on PS4? Sure all of those that don't reveal PS4 architecture features that could eventually be "misused".

The large majority of those business have moved into clang, thus reducing GCC usage to copyleft hardliners, Linux is visible on ChromeOS and Android but not on a context that it can fully profit from and then there is Fuchsia waiting on the backstage.

So in a couple of generations, when copyleft software is just a memory in digital books, we will have gone full circle to the days when buying developer software would entitle you to an extra floppy with a partial copy the source code.

The only difference is how that partial copy gets delivered, which will be just the upstream of non-copyleft software.

O.K. so we see the same things.

I can't discern from your writing tone, if you think the above is desirable or a train_wreck_in_slow_motion coming.

I think, it's the latter, not necessarily by direct effect, but by all the bad behavior this will enable in corporations for generations to come.