{% extends "base_compliance.html" %}

{% block subtitle %}Copyleft Compliance Projects - {% endblock %}

{% block submenuselection %}EnforcementStrategy{% endblock %}

{% block content %}

<p>As existing donors and supporters know, the Software Freedom Conservancy

  is a 501(c)(3) non-profit charity registered in New York, and Conservancy

  helps people take control of their computing by growing the software

  freedom movement, supporting community-driven alternatives to proprietary

  software, and defending free software with practical initiatives.

  Conservancy accomplishes these goals with various initiatives, including

  defending and upholding the rights of software users and consumers under

  copyleft licenses, such as the GPL.</p>

<h2 id="brief-history-of-user-focused-gpl-enforcement">Brief History of

  User-Focused GPL Enforcement</h2>

<p>The spring of 2003 was a watershed moment for software freedom on

  electronic devices. 802.11 wireless technology had finally reached the

  mainstream, and wireless routers for home use had flooded the market

  earlier in the year. By June

  2003, <a href="https://hardware.slashdot.org/story/03/06/08/1749217/is-linksys-violating-the-GPL">the

  general public knew that Linksys (a division of Cisco) was violating the

  GPL</a> on their WRT54G model wireless routers. Hobbyists discovered

  (rather easily) that Linux and BusyBox were included in the router, but

  Linksys and Cisco had failed to provide source code or any offer for source

  code to its customers.</p>

<p>A coalition formed made up of organizations and individuals — including

  Erik Andersen (major contributor to and former leader of the BusyBox

  project) and Harald Welte (major contributor to Linux’s netfilter

  subsystem) — to enforce the

  GPL. <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/about/staff/#bkuhn">Bradley

  M. Kuhn</a>, who is now Conservancy’s Policy Analyst and

  Hacker-in-Residence, led and coordinated that coalition (when he was

  Executive Director of the FSF). By early 2004, this coalition, through the

  process of GPL enforcement, compelled Linksys to release an

  almost-GPL-compliant source release for the

  WRT54G. A <a href="https://openwrt.org/about/history">group of volunteers

  quickly built a new project, called OpenWRT</a> based on that source

  release. In the years that have followed, OpenWRT has been ported to almost

  every major wireless router product.  Now, more than 15 years later, the

  OpenWRT project routinely utilizes GPL source releases to build, improve

  and port OpenWRT.  The project has also joined coalitions to fight the FCC

  to ensure that consumers have and deserve rights to install modified

  firmwares on their devices and that such hobbyist improvements are no

  threat to spectrum regulation.</p>

<p>Recently, OpenWRT decided to join Conservancy as one its member projects,

  and Conservancy has committed to long-term assistance to this project.</p>

<p>OpenWRT has spurred companies to create better routers and other wireless