Is it illegal to redistribute RHEL?Open Letter To Linux For You India

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Dear Mr Sandip,
I have noted down your points. Thanks for your valuable feed back. Slow and steady wins the race .I am getting
lot of responses and e-mails .I shall go on natural way of debating without fearing .Web is big information
super high way. Brickbats or Bouquets  All opinions are welcome . You can post your comments .All comments
are respected .I am preparing a table in which I shall list the name of the person with his e-mail ID.I shall
list GPL point by point. Against each point I am noting Redhat favorable comments by each if any /Noting
points against redhat policy  by each if any /Redhat comments on each point and compile the full table.
After making compilation I shall submit it to National Law University in Bangalore and request them to
conduct a debate in the University in public interest .I know  they conduct seminars on Copyrights IP
Trademarks FOSS and GPL and Law. I shall submit my report to LUG D and Linux for you editor. They can guide me. The
 debate is very important as( whether we need GPL any more or GPL is strong enough to    defend internal
threats).Internal threat are greater damaging than external  threats .If all companies adopt Redhat
trademark policy of RHEL and lock the Linux  distribution who will contribute free code for these Locked
Linux distributions . Who does not want to  make money if it easy to twist the GPL Redhat way .The dream of
Linux creater Linus Torvalds and Richard stallman of FSF will get shattered  .GPL should not be allowed to
become laughing stock in front of public. Layman  does not understand twisting of GPL. They only
understand four freedoms of GPL.  One more view on GPL.: GPL does not restrict any one to make  commercial
gains out of FLOSS.GPL only advocates that follow the GPL copyright License in letter and  spirit and earn
money by consulting support and services .Any one any company can get monetary benefit consulting
support and services.Redhat can
 use its trade mark for consulting support and services and training. like any other international
companies uses .RHCE certification is in most demand. As per industry reports IBM earns about 60 Billions
only on services per year..Most international Indian and Bangalore companies are making money in
millions of dollars only in consulting support and services and IT Training .They go  by laws of copyright
laws and  trademarks laws strictly . Basically the  project involves three components. consulting
support and services and Software and Hardware other infrastructure .These companies provide
consulting support and services for  all  technologies .Once you submit the project it is the customer who
finally select the the  technology. Now customers go for mix technologies .So companies provide
consulting support and services on any technologies let be it be Microsoft or Unix or Linux (may it be
Ubuntu or Redhat or Debian or SUSE OR Fedora ) or other
 technologies .Today it is virtualisation era .On single hardware companies can put in data centers all
Linux distributions all versions or any proprietary OS any software free or non free on single
server..They can run all Linux distributions at time in single server without rebooting the machine.
Service providers are ready  to put anything for customers.  Even redhat can gain commercially by
consulting support and services instead of Locking the front Gate of Gnu Linux distribution called RHEL
which is derived version of Fedora is a Linux based operating system that provides users with access to
the latest free and open source software, in a stable, secure and easy to manage form. Fedora strongly
believe in the bedrock principles that created all the components of operating system, and because of
this fedora project guarantee that Fedora will always be free for anybody, anywhere, to use, modify and
distribute. Another striking difference of Fedora
 is its goal to empower others to pursue their vision of what a free operating system should be like. Fedora
now forms the basis for derivative distributions such as Red Hat  Enterprise Linux , the One Laptop Per
Child XO and Creative Commons' Live Content DVDs.  But Redhat which makes the derived version of Fedora in
the name of RHEL closed the gates for redistribution with a seemingly trademark key and Lock. even though
it knows the fundamentals of FLOSS. The funniest part of Redhat policy is GPL fundamentals are  OK for
Fedora and its gate is open. But not OK for RHEL as its gate is locked ..
Red Hat Enterprise Linux (or RHEL) is a commercial derivative of Fedora tailored to meet the requirements
of enterprise customers. It is a commercial product from Red Hat which also sponsors Fedora as a community
project. Fedora is upstream for Red Hat Enterprise Linux but there are several other derivative
distributions available too. Upstream has open gate and downstream is Locked gate. Double standards
.Double crossing the community. (http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/RHEL).As general principal what is
OK for fedora it should be OK for RHEL. Redhat has two faces .One face for fedora and another face for RHEL.
Customers are having brains .The companies should treat them properly. They will ask hundred questions
cannot fool them with terminologies .They know what they are buying .Without violating the letter and
spirit of GPL Redaht can earn revenue by consulting support and services and training  .As it has created
huge brand equity for Redhat name and and
 it was not created by just by Locking the RHEL redistribution .In any case  CentOS has already opened the gate
of RHEL .There is no harm if redhat opens Locked gates of the RHEL now. Even RHEL is available for down load
for user with one month support free. After that customer is not paying he does not get support. Partial
gate is already open. from there he can link it to CentOS yum repository. Why all this customers can
directly take it from CentOS and connect yum repository of CentOS for updates. RHEL Gate is opened in the
name of CentOS. Redhat should understand this public opinion. Instead of forcing the open community for
round about forced exercise of making centos why not redhat open the gate in straight manner to satisfy
FOSS World. This is result in creating extra work for open community. . 
I am not against the commercial benefits of FLOSS. It's important to not
confuse "FLOSS" and "non-commercial". To see why, let’s first define key terms, “FLOSS” and
“commercial”: Please visit http://www.dwheeler.com/essays/commercial-floss.html FLOSS
projects give their users many more rights than proprietary products do. Most developers do this with the
expectation that others are likely to  contribute back to the project (with new/improved code,
documentation, bug reports, and so on). Thus, most “non-profit” FLOSS projects are actually trying
to achieve financial gain it just happens that they are trying to receive gains of  additional/improved
software instead of money. As Linux creator Linus Torvalds noted in a 2003 letter to SCO, the U.S. Code
Title 17, section 101 (the law that creates and defines copyrights in the U.S.) explicitly defines the
term “financial gain” as including “receipt, or expectation of receipt, of anything   of value,
including the receipt of other copyrighted works.” (Note the
 irony of a Finnish software engineer having to explain U.S. law to a U.S. Company.) Thus, while FLOSS
projects may not receive money directly, they typically do receive something of value in return --
namely, other copyrighted works (improvements). 

One more different view:Debian is different-Debian may have started out as a Purest GPLed typical Linux
distribution, but it is more than pure and purest as described by Linux for you Magazine in recent
article.. Other distributions, especially  commercial distributions like Red Hat and SUSE, still tend
to treat their Linux distribution like more traditional software products. Raw materials, in the form of
software from Free / Open Source projects, goes into a black box where it is packaged and prepared by the
vendor and comes out as if under     cellophane. The companies may provide the source code to their packages,
but they lock up their build and distribution processes tight by playing tricks with GPL. They trade the
complexity of the build, quality assurance and distribution processes in exchange for money. The upside
for their customers; simpler access to Linux. The downside for their customers; dependency on the
distribution  provider for new
 technology, quality control and ongoing support. Linking to the        
http://awtrey.com/tony/foss/debianisdifferent.php 

My Research work on the question Is it illegal to  redistribute RHEL ?shall continue .I shall be collecting
different views .Final conclusion shall
left to FOSS leaders and Redhat .I know that Redhat will respect majority public
opinion.
M.S.Yatnatti BangaloreKPN UNLIMITED Corporate Office:No.18/6, Executive chambers, Cunningham Road,
Bangalore – 560052. WEBSITE WWW.KPNUNLIMITED.ORG

      
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