Jaleco Borrows PocketNES Emulator Source Code

Thanks to Waxy.org for its story discussing Jaleco's apparently legitimate use of the public domain PocketNES emulator in a Game Boy Advance game without explicit permission, explaining: "While the emulation community was outraged, the emulator's programmer felt a bit differently." The article notes: "Like the recent Classic NES Series, Jaleco Entertainment's Jajamaru Jr. for the Gameboy Advance is a nostalgic reissue for the Japanese market... [that] includes five different emulated classic NES/Famicom titles from Jaleco's library: Ninja Jajamaru, Jajamaru's Great Adventure, Exerion, City Connection, and Formation Z." Although "Emulation fans were upset, with cries of copyright infringement", the emulator's author responded: "Yes, PocketNES is public domain... I wanted it to be public domain. This 'Jaleco incident', in fact, is the very reason I wanted to make it FREE (as in public domain) rather than 'GPL free' (strings attached). I'm not a fan of the GPL, I think it's selfish."

Comments

So... what's the story?

[Anonymous Coward]

Emulator author releases source to public domain. Company takes advantage of his generosity to use public domain source. Emulator author pleased that his source is being used. Everyone happy except fanboys who don't know what "public domain" means.

Am I missing something, or is there basically no story here?

Re:So... what's the story?

[Sparr0]

the dept part ALWAYS counts. if the title is a joke, the dept is the punchline. check out the 'pixel blocks for fun, profit' story from the 'not so much with the profit' dept

PocketNES contains GPLed code by the way...

[Dwedit]

PocketNES contains GPLed code by the way, it uses the MiniLZO Library. Jaleco is not using that component.