Request for free-distributable Broadcom's (G|LP)-PHY firmware

[Gábor Stefanik]

On Mon, Feb 21, 2011 at 10:59 AM, Stanislaw Gruszka <sgruszka at redhat.com> wrote:
> On Fri, Feb 18, 2011 at 04:21:29PM -0600, Larry Finger wrote:
>> On 02/18/2011 03:24 PM, Rafał Miłecki wrote:
>> >Few months later, is there any progress? Can we expect:
>> >
>> >1) Easier licensing of currently provided firmware (see Fedore case)
>> >2) Firmware for LP-PHY devices
>> >?
>>
>> I think we can forget this whole business. It seems that Broadcom is
>> content with their business model, even though knowledgeable Linux
>> users are avoiding their products like the plague.
>
> Broadcom will not release old firmware with redistributable license,
> because of legal concerns, which are ridiculous for everyone except
> them.
>
> http://lists.fedoraproject.org/pipermail/devel/2010-September/142893.html
>
> That sucks.
>

This looks like the same argument Intel is using to justify long
delays before releasing new firmware - it needs to pass regulatory
testing to ensure that regulatory restrictions in released FW cannot
be circumvented. Both seem rather odd in light of Atheros's
open-source firmware projects and general "conformant-by-default, but
no "DRM" to prevent regulatory infringement" policy - though I seem to
remember that Atheros acquired SDR certification, while Broadcom and
Intel both went for regular "part 11" certification only. AFAIK the
rules for SDRs are much more lax than those for part-11-only devices.

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