I agree with RH's decision.
I write software and release it as gpl3, source, it and all build
Makefiles! I give it out, and to those, I ask, only to provide me with
bug reports or some patch ideas to make the offering better.
What should I do, if the person I gave
the software to, removes my copyright, rebrands the software and sells
my software as their own? Is it right? And when I release a bug fix,
they take it, insert the fix into the rebranded copy they are selling,
and they quietly say, "Screw You, Leslie".
Suppose I was the government, and I did that same offer to end-users.
Would the redistribution be legit, and even honest, if from the
government, and it was for remuneration?
The right-or-wrong activity is really a discussion about ownership and
rules for sharing. In the Leslie case, Leslie is the owner. In the
government case, the people are the owners.
What right does a company have the right to clone and rebrand my product
and resell it? Under the gpl3, they have an unenforceable obligation
to provide me with bug reports. They do not have a moral right to
redistribute my software as their own, and for remuneration.
In two cases, at least two companies offer Linux as known Red Hat, clones. We
understand that they copy the sources, the bug fixes, and rebrand the
software as their own. In most cases, vanilla in -- vanilla out. But it is not revenue in, revenue shared.
What should Red Hat do to recover the costs for development of new
features, documentation, distribution, bug-fixes, 24/7 support as well,
the infrastructure that allowed an individual to freely download the
entire package. The clones have none of those obligations or costs? Red
Hat is financing Centos and Fedora. Moreover,
visit https://kojipkgs.fedoraproject.org/compose/
to get a small idea of the investment, operating costs, and end-user
benefits. Recall, Red Hat shareholders are not a government body.