There is debate as to whether the FreeZFS license (CDDL) is compatible with the GPL, which is why FreeZFS is not part of the Linux Kernel. Some distros are baking it in, but there has long been concern about if merging it violates the license or not.
Will this somehow liberate ZFS?
It’ll just make their auditors and legal team desperate for money, which is kinda horrifying to consider.
How does ZFS need to be liberated?
There is debate as to whether the FreeZFS license (CDDL) is compatible with the GPL, which is why FreeZFS is not part of the Linux Kernel. Some distros are baking it in, but there has long been concern about if merging it violates the license or not.
They took the entire Solaris code back to proprietary source and kept improving ZFS themselves. For instance, they added encryption.