Is Red Hat really an Open Source company ?
This question keeps cropping up every once in a while on different LUG lists where I lurk. It is a fairly established fact now in the FOSS world (or for that matter in the software world) that businesses can be both Open Source as well as commercial (ie: for profit). However, the specifics of the mechanism for doing this is still not well understood.
As an example, there was a post on the Mumbai GLUG list, questioning whether the restrictions on the distribution of Red Hat Enterprise Linux were similar to restrictions of an ELUA of proprietary software and whether copying RHEL CDs was piracy.
I think there are a few basic things that you need to understand before you understand the answers to your questions:
1. Unlike the proprietary world, FOSS does not distinguish between developer, user and distributor. Each person receiving FOSS software, has the right to assume any or all of the three roles. There is no 'END USER' (for an ELUA to exist). So from that perspective, you are a distributor if you share something (using a CD, online, pen-drive ...or any media).
2. Piracy is the practice of hijacking a naval vessel and plundering it. Software Piracy is a silly nonsensical term. Software related violations include things like copyright violation, trademark infringement and unfortunately patent violations ...etc.
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