I think there are many ways to meet various design requirements of consumer electronics devices while still respecting the rights that I think the other of the device should be given.
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Daniel hits on a key aspect that always bothered me: who the real "users" are. The GPL doesn't affect me as an end user, but it does affect me significantly as a developer, especially if my intent is to potentially create proprietary software products.
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How does the GPL stop you from creating proprietary software products? You can license proprietary equivalents of GPL software for any components you need. If you can't afford to do that then you have a business problem not a license problem.
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You misunderstood me - while technically possible, the ability to incorporate GPL software into proprietary software products is severely restricted. And yes, having to use out-of-process extensions to avoid the GPL propagation to proprietary code is limiting.
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Maybe you misunderstand me. You have choices. You can choose to build products out of GPL software and comply with it's licenses or choose to build products out of proprietary software and comply with it's licenses.
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GPL restricts usage and is a close cousin of those non-commercial licenses. Permissive licenses do exist.
Complying with licenses is itself a choice. GPL violation is the software equivalent of pirating a movie. Many people choose not to respect software licenses anyway.
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GPL doesn't restrict usage, just distribution. You can do whatever you want with GPL software including incorporating it into a new program. You just can't share it with someone else unless you give them the same rights to the whole program.
Everything else is fud.
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You're playing on the words here - yes, the GPL is applicable at distribution time, but having to distribute essential components of your software separately comes with several restrictions on how you can use it, the first one being that you can't link it statically.
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As a user I don't distribute software. As a developer I do.
Claiming that a developer distributing software is part of the use of software is playing tricks with words. If you don't understand the distinction then I'm not sure how else to explain like... computers... to you.
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Developers are the users of the source code. Both developers and other users distribute software all the time. Distributing software is part of using it. Source code doesn't do any good without developers to work with it and distribute software to end users based on their work.
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The only people playing tricks with words are the Free Software cultists trying to make up their own definitions of words and mislead people with the convoluted, nonsensical and dishonest talking points crafted over the decades. It's all a bunch of horseshit though.