Bitmain gears with the stock firmware do violate the GPLv3 license in the same manner that all of these custom devs do.
Just want to mention I either cant find the source code for following brands.
Ebang
Whatsminer
InnoSilicon
Cheetah Miner
Dragon Mint
Bitfily
Todek
PandaMiner
Baikal
StrongU
Lovecore
Goldshell
,...
Even the Bitmain S9 source for their modified cgminer is available online.
So you earlier mentioned that
every distribution should publish source code! only specific version of s9 which I believe it is too old is ok?!
What about other models?
If a custom firmware developer releases a source code from an old version which is impossible to find if it is the correct one, you will be satisfied?
I can't get it, why it is important to not replace a firmware with another one with the same condition which works better that stock one?
Why should anybody care about license since the big companies already ignore it and you as one of the developers accepted the situation?
What I see here is that you are only making excuses.
I totally agree with mikeywith, you are cherry-picking who to "fight".