Session: Copyleft Functions To Defend Software Freedom
Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) licensing fads come and go, but a stalwart of success — heralded from low-level software like Linux to top of the stack gems like WordPress — is the copyleft licensing structure.
Copyleft was invented in the 1980s to turn the tide of how software licensing occurs. Rather than restricting users, copyleft licenses such as the General Public License (GPL), grant rights and freedoms to consumers and individuals. The rights and permissions carry along with the software, so the most important person in the distribution chain — namely, the individual who wants to use the software to use the software to get their job done, or entertain themselves with it — has the most power and rights. Furthermore, copyleft assures via legal mechanisms that no one can take those rights and freedoms away from anyone else.
This talk will give a brief history of copyleft, then primarily focus on how copyleft works and functions today to assure rights. Software freedom is much like other essential rights in our society such as voting and free speech and assembly. Specifically, individual rights are under regular attack and, as essential in any free Republic, necessitate an educate populace who knows their rights and how to uphold and utilize them.
The aim of this talk to is educate users who may be unfamiliar with the rights that a copyleft license affords them, and what great benefits both developers and users receive from the unfettered right to study, improve, copy, modify, and reinstall modified versions of their software.