The drafting of gpl-v3 was the most publicly deliberative legal process in the history of free software licensing. Beginning in January 2006, the free-software-foundation conducted 18 months of public comment periods, discussion drafts, and international consultation before the final text was released on June 29, 2007. eben-moglen served as the primary legal drafter. The process was unprecedented: a free software license being developed with stakeholder input from corporations, developers, and civil society.
The two central innovations of gpl-v3 addressed vulnerabilities that had become visible during the gpl-and-linux-era-1991-1998 and free-vs-open-source-schism-1998-2007 periods. First, the anti-tivoization clause: TiVo had used GPLv2 Linux on its hardware but configured the device to reject modified kernels using cryptographic signatures. The modified software was technically available but unusable on the device it was designed for. GPLv3 requires that distributors of GPL software on consumer devices provide the "installation information" necessary to install modified versions. Second, explicit patent retaliation clauses addressed the threat of patent-encumbered software being distributed under GPL terms.
linus-torvalds refused to migrate the Linux kernel to GPLv3, a significant defection. Torvalds argued that the anti-tivoization clause was an overreach — that it regulated hardware rather than software — and that the patent provisions were too broad. The Linux kernel remains under GPLv2-only to this day, a permanent divide between the GNU/Linux system's most prominent component and the license philosophy of the gnu-project.
The agpl (Affero GPL), which the FSF endorsed as part of the GPL family, addressed the saas-loophole: companies like Google could run modified GPL software on servers and provide it as a service without ever distributing the modified source code, since the GPL's distribution requirements are only triggered by distributing software, not running it for users. The AGPL closes this loophole by treating network interaction as distribution.
stallman's broader digital rights activism expanded during this period to encompass digital-restrictions-management, software patents, surveillance, and electronic-frontier-foundation alignment. Essays including can-you-trust-your-computer and who-does-that-server-really-serve extended the four-freedoms framework to hardware, cloud computing, and surveillance.
The fsf-board-controversy-2019 marked the most serious crisis of Stallman's public career. In September 2019, comments Stallman made in an MIT email list discussion of the Jeffrey Epstein case — suggesting that Marvin Minsky's conduct with an Epstein victim may have been "entirely consensual" — became public. The backlash was severe. Stallman resigned from both the FSF presidency and his MIT visiting researcher position. He returned to the FSF board in 2021, which triggered a second wave of protests and an open letter from hundreds of free software developers calling for his removal. The FSF board retained him, producing a lasting institutional fracture in the free software community.