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A comment on We Love GPLv3, but Are Switching License to Apache 2.0. Parent comment

Re:We Love GPLv3, but Are Switching License to Apache 2.0 by FeepingCreature on Wednesday December 09, 2020 @05:36AM (#25357235)
Yes, but by the point your downstream project has changes that you want to merge back, it is the upstream for purposes of GPL sentiment. These roles are transactional, not historic.

Otherwise, any company could break the GPL wide open by just morally considering themselves to be the upstream.

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Re:We Love GPLv3, but Are Switching License to Apache 2.0 by quadrangle on Thursday December 10, 2020 @06:39PM (#25380305)
Not strictly. Downstream GPL users do not need to publish their changes. Businesses and individuals can get GPL software, change it for their own internal use and keep the changes private.

GPL's upstream features are incidental and often practical but are not the point of the GPL and more importantly do not describe how it works legally.

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