[−]jonathanstrange · 2026-11-15 Sun 16:09 UTC ·
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No, the four freedoms rely on copyright. If there is no copyright, any company can take the open source code, modify it as they like, and never give back the modifications to anyone. It's the equivalent of an MIT license (technically, it's more like public domain but let's ignore this detail here). That's fine for many but far from the goals of the GPL.
No copyright doesn't mean you can't keep your source code a tightly kept business secret. You can even combine it with NDAs and contracts to re-institute something akin to copyright.
No copyright doesn't mean you can't keep your source code a tightly kept business secret. You can even combine it with NDAs and contracts to re-institute something akin to copyright.