Deepest differences between GPLv3 and v2 are:<p>* Antitivoization clause: it bars its use in software that will only run if signatures are required. This guarantees freedom 0 (freedom to use the software) will not be circumvented and discourages vendors from shipping hardware that requires signed software.<p>* Antipatent clause: The license is revoked from an attacker if patents are used to attack users of the software.<p>These clauses maybe desired in some cases. Probably, a sensible direction could be to add flags to the GPLv2 to particularly enable these clauses. Somewhat similar to how it is done with CC licenses which may have BY, SA, or NC flags.