I'm not sure if this question fits to this board.
My company is going to deploy cloud service for our customers and we would
like to take CentOS 6 & CentOS 7 as choices of the OS template available
for virtual machines on our cloud platform. We would like to confirm that
we would legally distribute CentOS in such way commercially.
Many Thanks!
CentOS 7 for commercial use
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coatmaker618
- Posts: 15
- Joined: 2014/08/11 12:39:49
Re: CentOS 7 for commercial use
I'm NOT a lawyer, FFS don't take anything I say as legal advice....
but my understanding (not a lawyer) is that as long as the OS isn't the entirety of what you're selling, then there's no problem. You say you're offering some cloud service, so my guess is that you're selling a bundle which includes:
1) CentOS
2) Hardware (like, a computer)
3) Installation of CentOS on that hardware
4) Software/SaaS (your cloud service)
Don't charge for 1, but you shouldn't have any issues charging for 2, 3 or 4. And really, those are what's costing you money anyway!
Besides, people sell computers/services all the time. If you're that worried, have a company lawyer read over the GNU license & EULA from CentOS...if you're 3 guys in someone's basement who can't afford a company lawyer, then just don't charge for CentOS itself and you're probably fine (at least until you can afford a lawyer to advise you).
I wouldn't expect anything on an internet message board to hold up in court, you'd be better off finding other examples of companies who already do this type of thing.
but my understanding (not a lawyer) is that as long as the OS isn't the entirety of what you're selling, then there's no problem. You say you're offering some cloud service, so my guess is that you're selling a bundle which includes:
1) CentOS
2) Hardware (like, a computer)
3) Installation of CentOS on that hardware
4) Software/SaaS (your cloud service)
Don't charge for 1, but you shouldn't have any issues charging for 2, 3 or 4. And really, those are what's costing you money anyway!
Besides, people sell computers/services all the time. If you're that worried, have a company lawyer read over the GNU license & EULA from CentOS...if you're 3 guys in someone's basement who can't afford a company lawyer, then just don't charge for CentOS itself and you're probably fine (at least until you can afford a lawyer to advise you).
I wouldn't expect anything on an internet message board to hold up in court, you'd be better off finding other examples of companies who already do this type of thing.
Re: CentOS 7 for commercial use
Rack space hosting company uses CentOS on their servers, so it must be OK.