On 2023-07-22 09:55, frank saporito wrote: > On 7/22/23 02:29, Gordon Messmer wrote: >> From my point of view, Red Hat doesn't really sell software. They >> give away software. All of their software is available at no charge, >> typically in an unbranded release. What Red Hat sells is support. > > Does Red Hat give away software anymore? Yes? I'm not aware of any Red Hat software that isn't Free Software. > I am confused. Last month Red Hat announced that the source code > would not be published. That's not what they announced. The major-release branch of RHEL's source code is still published to the CentOS Stream git repos. I think it's important to point out that Red Hat never published *all* of RHEL's package source code. For the first six months of any release of RHEL, they would publish de-branded source by essentially taking one artifact from each build (the src.rpm), unpacking that in a git repository, removing the primary source code archive, debranding what was left, committing all of that, and then pushing the result. It was basically git as a fancy FTP. They've stopped doing that, in favor of publishing the major-release branch of the git repos for the entire primary support lifecycle of the major release. > The spirit of GPL was meant to force sharing and prevent the > commercialization of the volunteer work of many. It definitely wasn't. GPL software can't be made closed-source. Customers have to receive the source code (or an offer for it), and they have the rights that the license guarantees. But GPL software can definitely be commercialized.