Re: [Fwd: [PATCH 8/12] LED: Add LED device support for ixp4xx devices]

[Arjan van de Ven <arjan@infradead.org>]

On Sun, 2006-02-05 at 23:00 -0800, Dan McDonald wrote:
> 
> On Mon, 6 Feb 2006, Arjan van de Ven wrote:
> 
> > On Sun, 2006-02-05 at 19:20 -0800, Andrew Morton wrote:
> >> Richard Purdie <rpurdie@rpsys.net> wrote:
> >>>
> >>> +MODULE_AUTHOR("John Bowler <jbowler@acm.org>");
> >>> +MODULE_DESCRIPTION("IXP4XX GPIO LED driver");
> >>> +MODULE_LICENSE("MIT");
> >>
> >> MIT license is unusual.  There's one other file in the kernel which uses it
> >> and that's down in MTD where nobody dares look.
> >>
> >> I don't know whether MIT is GPL-compatible-for-kernel-purposes or not.  Help.
> >
> > would be really nice if the author would at least dual license it under
> > the GPL as well (and thus also granting the patent rights if any)
> 
> It would be really nice, but that doesn't make the rights to any patents 
> granted unless 'GPLv2 or any later version' is explicitly specified. The 
> default GPL license is v2 and only v2. There was a bug thread about this 
> on LKML earlier.

wrong. v2 already is a statement that the author doesn't have patents on
the code, or alternatively that the author has granted you the patent
rights and will not sue you for using the code. it's also a statement
that the author doesn't have patent licenses from 3rd parties that
he/she cannot sublicense.

v3 clarifies and expands on this most likely, but v2 already offers
basic patent trap protection.