Enforcement of the GNU GPL in Germany and Europe

• Author: Till Jaeger
• Position: Dr. iur., Partner at JBB Rechtsanwälte, Berlin; Co-founder of the Institute for Legal Questions on Free and Open Source Software (ifrOSS); Representative of gpl-violations.org project in its enforcement activities.
• Pages: 34-39

2010

34

1

A. Rationale for enforce-

ment of the GPL

At present, the enforcement of the GPL license 1

conditions is driven by single developers and

organizations supporting Free Software. Most

famous is Mr. Harald Welte, former maintainer

   

the enforcement project gpl-violations.org. Some

years ago, Mr. Welte became aware of the fact

that many manufacturers use the Linux kernel

in their products without complying with the

GPL conditions, and give the necessary credit to

the Free Software community. His letters to the

companies remained mostly unanswered or ne-

gotiations were so protracted that by the time

the source code was eventually published, the

relevant product was no longer available for sale.

Therefore, he decided to take legal action in a

more formal way.

 2

more and more interested parties informed Mr.

Welte about other violations. He then decided

to establish ‘www.gpl-violations.org’ to provide

a platform for enforcement activities and public

documentation of his and others’ efforts to bring

commercial GPL users into GPL compliance.1 Hav-

 -

nical devices is a strong motivation to partic-

ipate in the enforcement of the GPL, and thus

many people support gpl-violations.org.

In 2006, the FSF Europe launched a Freedom 3

Task Force (FTF) to collect and share knowl-

edge about Free Software law and safeguard

the interests of Free Software projects. FTF

cooperates with gpl-violations.org with re-

gard to GPL compliance issues and facilitates

the European Legal Network (ELN), where

Abstract: GPL enforcement is successful in Europe. In several court decisions and out of court

settlements the license conditions of the GPL have been successfully enforced. In particular, embedded

systems are the main focus of such compliance activities. The article describes the practice of

enforcement activities and the legal prerequisites under the application of German law.

Enforcement of the GNU GPL

in Germany and Europe

by Till Jaeger

Dr. iur., Partner at JBB Rechtsanwälte, Berlin; Co-founder of

the Institute for Legal Questions on Free and Open Source

Software (ifrOSS); Representative of gpl-violations.org

project in its enforcement activities.

© 2010 Till Jaeger

Any party may modify and pass on this article as physical copies and by electronic means and make it available for download

under the terms and conditions of the Free Digital P eer Publishing Licence (f-DPPL). The text of the licence may be accessed

and retrieved via Interne t at http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:00 09-fdppl-v3-en3.

As an alter native, this article may also be used under the Creative Commons Attribu tion-Share Alike 3.0 Unporte d License,

available at http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0.

Recommended citation: Jae ger, Till, Enforcement of the GNU GPL in Germany and Europe, 1 (2010) JIPITEC 34 , para. 1.

Keywords: Free Software, Open Source Software, GNU GPL, enforcement, out of court proceedings,

license violation, damages