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Chinese Linux Developers Allegedly Violating Licenses
sasha328 was among several to submit a story about problems with Chinese Developers allegedly violating licenses by not re-releasing their mods to various open source projects. There's not a lot of evidence presented, but a lot of points made without telling us what code and what license. But I'm sure we'll see more of this in the future.
Read the friggin' license, folks.
The GPL does not require that code be given back to the origional developers. It requires that it be given to the people to whom you distribute the software.
Basically, they've forked the projects. Big deal.
Get over it. It's time to move on.
I have discovered a truly marvelous sig, unfortunately the sig limit is too small to contain i
IMHO there is little to be concerned about in practice, all the offenders are doing is making life difficult for themselves.
As each new 'legit' release is made, the piractes will have to retro-fit their own custom changes again, and again and again...
This will leave those that break the licence terms increasingly behind those that play by the rules of the game.
So far I found two misconceptions here:
China is being ruled by communism. Therefore, Hong Kong, a city of China, is also a communists city. Hong Kong is a Special Administrative Region of China. It has an international financial market and runs on capitalism.
China and Hong Kong do not respect IP and Copyright. China's law can bypass any license agreement. Pirate copying of copyright software is illegal in China and Hong Kong. Especially in Hong Kong, its legal system is based on common law, same legal system in British and US.
Furthermore, effective on 1/4/2001, companies and individuals possessing pirated software will be subjected to max. fine of HK$50,000 per copy and jail. Police, with court's warrant, can enter(bash) any place to confiscate computer equipment containing pirated software without piror notice.
A poor 14-year old boy was just caught for hosting MP3 sites. He was at home while police bashing his door.
It's true that you can find illegal-copied software everywhere. In Hong Kong police can jail you immediate if you are being caught carrying them. Try showing your collection of pirated software at China's custom, but bear in mind the max. penality for smuggling in China is not just jailing.
(in an unrelated story, while companies were busy looking for enough legal licenses before new law enforced, Microsoft had raised the price of all Windows/Office software. Those suckers.)
So, if you planned to come here for cheap pirated software, think about it.
wow, the GPL is being violated in China.. perhaps these are some bigger issues from China:
Outlaw group is mass killed
tibet situation, caused by China
see what a Chinese 'criminal' has done to deserve jail
Chinese government illegally harvests organs
obviously a lot of problems exist in China, anyone interested should visit human rights in china
Uh, yeah, well said.
Chinese law and custom does not recognise any intellectual property, including copyright.
The GPL says "This source is copyright Joe Developer. However, you may copy or modify it if blah blah blah..."
They'll just stop reading at "This source is copyright". And they have the law (Chinese law) on their side.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
(The original punched-parchment scrolls of Linux were illicitly smuggled out of China by spice traders, and centuries later ended up in the archives of an obscure Finnish museum. It's not clear what happened after that.)