The fourth and final draft of version 3 the GNU General Public License was released by the Free Software Foundation late Thursday. The GPLv3 addresses multiple issues central to the debate over patent protection, and contains some specific wording to undermine any further patent protection agreements like the one Novell and Microsoft set up in November, 2006.
Most importantly on that front, draft 4 of the GPLv3 protects Novell's interests by allowing it to distribute software licensed under the GPL without violating its current agreement with Microsoft.
You can read an FAQ about the changes in this draft, and you should also read Richard Stallman's essay about why developers should update their software to be compatible with the new license.
On its website, Novell says it remains committed its patent deal with Microsoft, but that it's also looking forward to offering customers GPLv3-licensed SUSE Linux products.
The meat of the patent protection wording is in Section 11 of the draft. The new license extends protection from patent infringement claims to all free software users. There's also some specific wording that prevents deals like the Microsoft-Novell agreement from happening in the future. As the FSF explains on its website:
Other changes to the final draft of the GPLv3:
- Compatibility has been extended to include version 2 of the Apache License.
- Support for BitTorrent has been included.
- Statements outlining restrictions on how hardware running GPLv3-licensed software can behave, which are intended to protect consumers, have been clarified.
- Statements concerning how GPLv3-licensed software can be modified have also been clarified.
UPDATED at 1:00PM PDT to clarify wording about the consumer protection statements in the GPLv3, and to change the headline.
