If you look at the Artifex license page (http://www.artifex.com/indexlicense.htm) you will actually see that they have a very strange interpretation of the GPL. They basically claim that you can't bundle Ghostscript together with non-GPL programs, or install it with the same installer. If they used the same legal advice for writing their licensing terms as they have used for filing the lawsuit, then it might turn up in the end that the whole case has no merit...

This claim is like the difference between Windows and Linux (and GNU and other animals). There are those that prefer a large set of suboptimal washed out solutions, one-size-fits all. Others prefer the freedom of being able to choose the components that fit them. By tying a library to a set of libraries you are in for the first choice. Personally I'm happy that I can choose a more optimal (and evolving) solution. The bundling also has the disadvantage that a new version (e.g. a bugfix) in a library is a new version of the whole system. No thanks.

My preferred password solution is still KeyRing (http://gnukeyring.sourceforge.net/ ). It satisfies the requirement that it is a non-connected device and that the data is stored in strong encryption. A similar application for a mobile phone would be a next best. At least until someone writes a keylogging virus for the mobile phones and then steals your data. But that is much more likely to happen on Windows.