13zero

Some of the changes in GPLv3 seem to address this type of behavior. There might be some narrow gaps that Red Hat is taking advantage of, but the folks at GNU at least made things harder.

Got it.

I don’t see how that could comply with the terms of the GPL.

They might also be banking on GPLv3 contributors being unable/unwilling to take them to court. The Linux kernel is GPLv2, and its contributors are probably more of a legal threat than anything else in RHEL.

Frankly, I’m more concerned about the precedent this sets for the GPL.

If Red Hat can do this, then there’s nothing (legally) preventing every other megacorp from ending public contributions to Linux and other GPL projects, forking them, and releasing them under restrictive contractual terms.

Granted, not everyone would take their code private. Microsoft and Apple make some contributions to BSD/MIT/etc. licensed software even though they are not required to. However, I think we’d miss out on quite a lot of FOSS development.

What stops one person with a free account from mirroring the source?

It’s also against the spirit of the GPL if not the letter. Red Hat isn’t just required to release source code to its customers upon request; that source code comes with GPL rights and restrictions attached (including the right to distribute).

Is it legal for Red Hat to require customers to waive their GPL rights? I don’t think it should be, but I don’t think courts are particularly friendly to copyleft holders.