Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) license compliance is a contentious topic. There are different perspectives about when and how license terms apply, about which licenses can be used together, and about how potential issues should be resolved. Veteran gpl-violations.org and FSFE contributors Armijn Hemel and Shane Coughlan examine the situation and what can be done to improve matters.

One of the goals of the Software Freedom Law Center (SFLC) is to become a center for education in free and open source software (FOSS) legal issues.

Armijn Hemel (gpl-violtions.org, Loohuis Consulting) and Shane Coughlan (Opendawn, FSFE) complete a trilogy of articles examining FOSS licensing issues and best practice on LWN.net with an outline of FOSS license compliance for companies.

UPC, one of Ireland's largest internet service providers, has won a major legal victory against four of the world's most powerful record companies over the much-contested issue of online music piracy.

Yesterday a very small company won a very big victory against a very large software vendor.

The Free Software Foundation's (FSF) Free Software Licensing and Compliance Lab held a public question and answer session in an IRC meeting last night. The meeting was conducted by Brett Smith, the licensing compliance engineer at the FSF.

If you’re serious about improving your company’s business practices, you probably want answers to some simple questions: “What’s important?” “What should I focus on and where do I start?” “What are best-in-class companies doing that I ought to be doing, too, and what can I learn from them?” That’s what the free Self-Assessment Checklist from The Linux Foundation’s Open Compli

"...This is a guide to effective compliance with the GNU General Public License (GPL) and related licenses. In accordance with the Software Freedom Law Center’s (SFLC’s) philosophy of assisting the community with GPL compliance cooperatively, this guide focuses on avoiding compliance actions and minimizing the negative impact when enforcement actions occur.

Over the past twelve months or so I've noticed an upswing in enquiries about free software compliance. For example, someone might be seeking access to source code for embedded devices with Linux and/or Busybox on them.