GPL restrictions on distributing to a selected number of clients?

Question

I have a small desktop application that depends on VLC, a GPL licensed application. It does not link to any VLC libraries, but creates a VLC subprocess and passes through stdin and stdout streams. My application will be used by a number of clients. This will not be a publicly available tool.

What does the GPL require me to do in this situation? I only need open source code for these clients? Or do I need to make it publicly available to the whole world?

EDIT
A few people have mentioned that if I just call the GPL executable, I don’t actually get the GPL code, I’m fine. However, I am not sure about this after seeing these sources:

• Discussion Joel
• GPL Faq

I will accept an answer that can clarify this problem for me.

Answer 1

This answer does not apply, you only start VLC

If everything you do launches and distributes VLCs, you must provide the complete (even if modified) VLC source code to anyone who receives it from you. If you refer to (or c) the GPL2 / GPL3 code, the GPL applies to the entire code base. This is none of your business.

Original answer due to a rather vague question :

After its distribution, the GPL is applied. If you pass it on to your wife, the GPL applies. If you give it to your neighbor, the GPL applies. If you give it to your dog, you can be safe, I doubt that the dog will understand his rights under the GPL.

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Answer 7

I am not a lawyer, but I believe that you cannot distribute VLC for money (for example, on a CD without your free application). If you use any code from VLC, your application must be open source.

But basically, I think that you will have to tell your customers: "I can not legally distribute VLC with this disk, please get it from" Or, maybe in your installer just download it from the official site.