HTC's delays in releasing Linux source code are unacceptable

What's especially interesting about the HTC case is that they'll habitually trot out the 120 days claim (up from 90 days a year ago) right up until the point where you actually start threatening legal action, at which point the source will usually suddenly appear on their website. The impression I get is that their delaying is nothing to do with any technical requirements on their end - it's purely to keep the source private for longer out of some kind of desire for competitive advantage.

This would be a perfect opportunity to get some lawyers in a room and try to use the DMCA, son-of-SOPA (whatever passes), etc and try to bludgeon copyleft infringers with the new IP-is-our-god-now laws. Especially if they're using a website to distribute binaries without source - start sending takedown notices

This is sort of an aside but what of anything of real value is in these source code releases other than things that would only apply to HTC phones? Just curious if there is anything in these patches that would apply to linux in general.

This is the problem with any license, contract, or other formal agreement. It can say whatever, and one party or the other can simply ignore it. You have to take them to court to force compliance, and since it's a civil matter you have to pay your lawyers to do that.<p>It's the same technique insurance companies use to deny claims: they know you will have to sue them to get them to pay, and this is so expensive and takes so long that a lot of people will just give up.

2-3 years ago I've been an huge HTC fan buying every 6 months a new HTC handset until I realized that they want you to buy new handsets all the time with their business model, Sense and reluctant update policy. The rest of the crowd (Sony, Motorola, etc.) isn't better but the case HTC feels shady—these guys shotgun tons of new phones per quarter to the market with many many variations of Sense, their drivers, witholding sources, etc. to make it impossible to update their crappy phones.

This is a perfect example of the Free Software movement's lack of teeth. Even if they do manage to get the money together to sue HTC, the company will have no problem demonstrating the type of bureaucratic structure that would make source code take four months to be released.

While I sympathize with the writer of this post, I don't really see what recourse he has? If the license allows for 120 days before they have to release the source code, what could he possibly do?