Comment Re:Makes the GPL real in their eyes. (Score 2, Insightful) 508
Microsoft played by the rules, and you're upset about it?
Not quite...they decided to use GPL'd code contrary to the licence and so were guilty of copyright infringement (or piracy). When pointed out, they decided to obey the licence and release the code as GPL.
What most people are upset about is not that they've released the code as GPL, but the REASON they gave for doing it. To be honest they would have announced (something like):
It has been pointed out to us that we had used GPL code contrary to the GPL licence and decided that instead of pursuing another licence for the code we have decided to fulfil the obligation of the GPL licence by releasing our code under the GPL, which will benefit the community by...
However, they hushed up the fact of the GPL violation.
So the conclusion is that MS weren't interested in playing by the rules and were only forced to release the code when they were caught red handed with a copyright infringement (which is the result of ignoring the GPL).
The question that comes to me as a result of this is: how much code have they got away with using contrary to the licence of said code, ie of how much copyright infringement are MS guilty? The advantage of closed source code...