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Mambo Users Threatened
An anonymous reader writes "Newsforge has an article about a recent dispute over code in Mambo (a Free CMS). A Mr. Connolly has sent threatening emails to Mambo users over this, a move John Weathersby of OSSI was quoted as saying 'That's ... not prudent.' The dispute is over some trivial code that checks whether a story is a lead story and if so displays it across multiple columns, as it's a modification of GPL code the Mambo team maintain it must remain GPL but Mr. Connolly claims otherwise."
The Newsforge report says that Mr. Connolly never redistributed the disputed code... therefore the disputed code is _not_ under the GPL. Under the GPL, you can do what you like with the code; you only have to GPL your modifications if you re-distribute.
That's his response? I think "Your mama" might be better than that.....weak weak weak
http://jayceecorder.blogspot.com
...between himself and the developer but despite numerous requests he has refused to produce it."
He should just type one up in MS Word and use that.
A fake document can be used as evidence.
Just ask Dan Rather.
We must be alert to the danger that public policy could become captive to a scientific-technological elite. - Eisenhower
If you are presently using the software application "Mambo OS" in any release post October 3, 2003, you and your organization are potentially exposed to CIVIL LITIGATION and possibly CRIMINAL PROSECUTION.
FUD. More FUD. Even more FUD.
What kind of idiot thinks FUD == Money? Hasn't SCO proven that FUD != Money? *sigh*
The dangers of knowledge trigger emotional distress in human beings.
Mambo
This site is temporarily unavailable.
Please notify the System Administrator.
Did their servers catch on fire from the subscribers?
Anyone have a cache?
I disable sigs...do you?
When are we going to start putting the Coral link IN THE STORY around here?
Only in a Slashdot fantasy can a Slackware install turn into several hours of sex . . . . .
CMS is "content management system." It is a program to make something like a "newspaper" type web page -- what you might see when you go to NYTimes.com.
;)
It took me a long time to figure that out, so I think I should get some upmodding here. Oh BTW, I have mod points myself right now, so if you are *bad*, I'm commin' after you
WARNING Issued to Users of Popular Software Application
Wednesday, September 15, 2004
CHICAGO, September 15, 2004 -- The following is an Open Letter from Furthermore, Inc. to the Open Source and Technology Community Regarding the Misappropriation of Intellectual Property:
If you are presently using the software application "Mambo OS" in any release post October 3, 2003, you and your organization are potentially exposed to CIVIL LITIGATION and possibly CRIMINAL PROSECUTION.
Our company, Furthermore, Inc., owns the code that enables the appearance and management of the "Lead Story Block" in Mambo. This code was taken without our permission by a lead member of the Mambo Development Team and put into Mambo's core program. Our copyright was then attributed to Miro International. Here we are reiterating our ownership of the Intellectual Property and issue a formal WARNING that we are preparing to file legal action against users of this application.
Do know that we've tried to resolve this cooperatively. However, the leadership of the Mambo Project is intractable in their misunderstanding in fact and law. They wrongly contend that since the code was put into the "General Public License" pool, it too must be GPL. Also, they wrongly contend that as our trade secrets have been variously modified, they are immune.
Bottom line: As express permission was never granted, their transfer of copyright ownership without express written authority is null and void. Also, the right to use any/all derivative works also was/is not granted as defined by law. Lastly, using a trade secret to gain unfair advantage is by definition against the law.
Anticipating that problems like these would be greatly amplified by the Internet, the US Congress recently and significantly strengthened the power of the law. As a result, the consequences of an infringement have never been more stringent. In addition to the punitive monetary damages that are being awarded in related civil suits, the law now makes these types of activities a federal crime.
In 1997, Congress passed the No Electronic Theft Act; and in 1996, it passed the Economic Espionage Act.
The NET Act makes copyright infringement a crime. It's a misdemeanor if it is done for commercial advantage or private financial gain, or by making or distributing one or more copies of copyrighted works that have a total retail value in excess of $1,000 within a 180-day period. It's a felony if it involves a minimum of ten copies of copyrighted works with a retail value of more than $2,500 within a period of six months. To date, NET Act related cases primarily involve pirates accused of illegally copying and distributing copyrighted computer software over the Internet. Sentencing under the NET include substantial fines and imprisonment of 3 to 10 years.
The EEA makes it a crime to steal (or misappropriate) trade secrets. The Act makes even the attempt or conspiracy to steal or misappropriate trade secrets a crime. The Act includes both direct and indirect theft of a trade secret, including its alteration or destruction. Individuals and organizations convicted of violating the EEA face severe penalties. Section 1832 of the Act covers theft of a trade secret "that is related to or included in a product," including both direct and indirect theft of a trade secret, including its alteration or destruction. A person convicted of violating Section 1832 faces a fine of up to $500,000 or a prison sentence of up to 10 years, or both, while any organization that commits any offense described in Section 1832 may be fined up to $5,000,000.
Lastly, we deeply regret that we have no choice but to seek remedy from the users of Mambo. Mambo has explicitly informed us that "the Mambo project can offer no further assistance in this matter. Mambo can not be party to any disputes between individuals or companies concerning the use of Mambo." Plainly, it's you the user they've left holding the bag.
Sincerely,
Brian Connolly
President
Furthermore, Inc.
+++ UGUCAUCGUAUUUCU
Statement regarding Furthermore.com
As many of you are aware for the last few weeks a Mr Connolly of Furthemore.com and Literati Inc has made several threats and claims to the Mambo Community regarding alleged use of his code and his ideas in producing "the leading story functionality." in the frontpage of Mambo.
We were initially very surprised at Mr Connolly's claim as they date back to an alleged breach of copyright that occurred 366 days ago.
We have investigated these claims and believe that:-
1. The dispute relates to an alleged breach of contract between Mr Connolly and the privately commissioned developer and is thus nothing to do with Mambo
2. The code in question is a derived work of existing GPL code and therefore must remain GPL.
3. By continuing to distribute Mambo on his site, Mr Connolly has acknowledged that Mambo is GPL and Copyright Miro International Pty.
In addition it has always been a fundamental part of Mr Connolly's claims that whilst he is perfectly happy for the code to remain within Mambo he wants:-
1. The code to be released under a non GPL License
2. The right to prevent the code being used on ANY site that HE decides is in competition with Futhermore.com
Mr Connolly alleges that a contract exists between himself and the developer but despite numerous requests he has refused to produce it.
We the Mambo Dev team together with Miro International Pty. are not prepared to tolerate this situation any further. The personal abuse, threats etc issued by Mr Connolly have no place in an Open Source community project. As a result earlier today we issued Mr Connolly with a final ultimatum to produce his evidence. Not surprisingly he has not.
We therefore take the view that these claims are frivolous and without substance.
This matter is now in the hands of our legal advisors and we will be making no further public statements, nor will we permit any further discussions on this matter to take place in the official forums as they have only resulted in further personal abuse.
All of this has been a traumatic experience for the Mambo Dev Team who have had to suffer abusive emails and telephone calls. All of which has taken us away from the development of Mambo and the release of 4.5.1
Show your support of the Mambo Dev Team and the Mambo Community itself by voting for mambo as the Best Free Software Project of 2004 at
http://www.linuxformat.co.uk/awards.
We, the Mambo Dev Team, would like to publicly thank all of you, the Mambo Community, who have offered support over this difficult time.
Last Updated( Friday, 03 September 2004 )
We must be alert to the danger that public policy could become captive to a scientific-technological elite. - Eisenhower
...when he could have written a slanderous mambo?
Open source developers need to err on the side of rejecting submissions rather than risk accepting corrupted ones. From the sounds of it, Sakic took some of the work he was paid to do exclusively for Connelley and gave it away to the Mambo guys. If that be the case, and we wouldn't know until the shit really hits the fan, then it would be very cut and dry: Sakic was wrong and the Mambo guys should have known better.
Granted the laws should be changed, because as they stand right now they only benefit lawyers. If company A believes company B has a legal right to sell a product to company A then it should be immune to litigation, and company B should be the one that gets hit. Company A should have the legal right to rewrite the code until it is no longer the infringing code. The time frame, and whether the old code would have to be stripped immediately would of course be set by law.
Maybe the safest bet until that happens, if it ever happens, is for OSS projects to bite the bullet and do even more work "in house" than accept submissions rather than risk getting SCO'd.
Click here or a puppy gets stomped!
The chief component of FUD is Fear... Fear and Doubt. Doubt and Fear. The TWO components of FUD are Fear and Doubt... And Uncertainty. The THREE components of FUD are Fear Uncertainty and Doubt... and an almost fanatical devotion to litigation.
Tito Puente has anounced that he too will be suing Mambo.
"Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
I could be misunderstanding it, but Connolly seems to be saying his code, which he paid a developer to write and told he could not GPL and rerelease it, was put into the Mambo main branch, while his developer is saying it's similar code in function, not [necessarily] form, and reimplementing it for free after being paid to write a proprietary version isn't the same as submitting the code he wrote for Connolly to the Mambo source tree. I could be mistaken here, but couldn't this easily be resolved by a simple comparison of the Mambo and Futuremore source code? I mean, really.
In addition, the Newsforge article's summary claims that Connolly's code is out in the wild, whether it should be or not. That's not been proven, in any of the data I've read. Shouldn't the dispute first resolve whether the code is actually from the Furthermore source before the issue of licensing even comes up?
I don't know about you, but this does sound a lot like SCO...
10 PRINT "Your open source project has our code!"
20 PRINT "Prove it!"
30 PRINT "We don't have to prove it, it's our code!"
40 GOTO 20
It's only an insult if it's not true.
That is the crux of the matter. Gee, if I modify gpl code and then redistribute it under gpl and the accompanying source, I'm going to get sued for copyright infringement?
I hope the EFF beats this guy with a cluestick if he starts coming after people like Darl, but I have a feeling that he is just waving his internet penis and doesn't intend on doing anything except threatening. Only time will tell.
Chris
The point of the GPL is not to provide free (as in beer) software to the world, but to ensure that anyone who takes something from the software community also contributes back to the same software community. Think of it as a barter system for software ideas. The Fortune 500 companies you speak of do not give anything free (as in beer) to anyone, so why should they be expected to get free code?
While the first bit of the newsforge article almost goes out of its way to give Connelly's claims the benefit of doubt, the most interesting bit is the coder's (Sakic) reply at the very very end of the article (I know most of you didn't or can't read that far ;) ).
The original developer has replied to the Newsforge article (now at the end) and says that the code in Mambo is taken from a GPL distribution and has no relation to the "alledged stolen" code.
It's a good thing that this is GPL code so that the users have some level of protection from the license and Connolly will probably end up in serious difficulties.
Sakic claims that the code implimented for Mambo was not derived from the Furthermore code, that these were independent implimentations, and that the Mambo code even had differing features.
Secondly, IANAL, but I don't think an end user is really subject to litigation in this case. SCO vs. DCC was mostly thrown out and the court concurred that DCC was *not* required to certify that it was not either using Linux or contributing to it. Using software which has infringing code is probably not a crime to my knowledge. Distributing it is. So he could go after distributors, but this is like saying: "You unwittingly bought a counterfit copy of WIndows. We will charge you with piracy." I don't think that this would fly in court.
IANAL, but Connelley's legal analysis seems to be as strange as SCO's. The Newsforge article seems to indicate that he has not even done code comparison! As a professional, if I suspect that something is wrong, this is the *first* thing I would do rather than the last. Indeed he could be opening himself up to serious lawsuits (tortuous interference). In general, though IANAL, I would think that a lawyer would suggest investigative work before public announcements. This tells me he probably hasn't talked to one....
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
How it is flamebait to point this out is beyond me. Oh yeah, I forgot, this is slashdot. Rational discourse seldom holds sway...
you cant copyright colspan
I check slashdot, and now I know why it's dead.
Introducing Microsoft Vacuum 1.0 The first Microsoft product that doesn't suck.
I think GPL has a place. I think it's in application software. Utility libraries should be BSD or PD.
Does everything include nothing?
He is redistributing Mombo from his website, but theoretically it would only be original Mombo code (without his contracted mods) if the mods hadn't made it back into the main branch.
If I were paid to, say, take The Horde, and make modifications to it for a company in order to make it interact with product X, thereby giving this company a (percieved) advantage over their competitors, I have no right to take the modifications and give them back to the The Horde development team without permission from the company I was contracted by.
Now, If the company I wrote the code for were to go on and sell "their version" of The Horde, it would have to be GPL'd, but they are only using it internally - so it doesn't.
This is one of the advantages of OSS to comercial entities - they can take the code, modify it to their needs and use it without hassle. They can make money with an OSS program, they just can't make money off selling a derivative of a program without sharing the love (GPL'ing it).
Although, I'd like to see this guy do the noble thing and release the changes back to the Mombo team as a show of good will and gratitiude for being able to use the code as a base for his success, he is in no way compelled to do so.
"terrorism" and "pedophilia" are the root passwords to the Constitution
Many of us that choose the GPL without thinking do it because we want to go down that road. Being a lemmings isn't that bad as long as you get the right player.
- These characters were randomly selected.
I love this paragraph. As a long time /. reader, it just had me snickering away...
"Who are in control, they are not in control of anything - they don't even control themselves!" - Glen Beck
while (!asleep()) sheep++
Just like the SCO case can simply be resolved by code comparison, right?
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
Sun took a BSD and made it Solaris. Apple took a BSD and made it MacOS X. Nobody have seen the code to these improvements. Now compare that to RedHat's or IBM's or SUSE's (and other businesses) contributions to the Linux kernel.
I'll do the stupid thing first and then you shy people follow...
as the owner of the copyright, you have every right to turn back.
you cant unrelease old versions.
but you can change the license at any point, it is your property.
Post-Nuke
Drupal
Xoops
e107
Xaraya
Mambo in the middle at close second place, MUCH better than Post-Nuke and Xaraya. Their main website hasn't been doing too bad handling the traffic as of this post, so I guess we'll see how it is by the end of the day.
Brian Connolly will distort this story every way til Tuesday, but there is only one set of facts that matter in this case:
1. Brian Connolly paid a Mambo Open Source developer to modify 9 trivial lines of an existing GPL component.
2. One month later, the developer added a similar technique to the Mambo core.
3. Brian Connolly's actual code NEVER appeared in the core Mambo software in any way shape or form.
4. Therefore, any of Connolly's claims are based solely on protecting his big "trade secret", or the very "idea" of displaying a leading story following by two columns of headlines.
5. Any programmer knows how trivial this is, and that this layout technique has been in use since the advent of HTML tables. It is not a "trade secret" that has any protection under any law.
Please contact Brian Connolly and ask him to produce the offending code. He will not be able to because it simply does not exist.
- A Mambo User and Developer
p.s. Furthermore also claims it never distributed the software. This is not only false (we have screenshots of his old download section) but irrelevent given the facts above.
Emir Sakic, the developer of code in dispute:
"I modified an existing Mambo frontpage component and hardcoded nine lines of code that would display the leading story."
"A month later (October 3, 2003) I developed similar functionality and contributed it to Mambo core. I did not use the same code as the nine lines delivered to Connolly. I implemented a different, dynamic solution with selectable frontpage settings."
"Mr Connolly still claims that Mambo contains the code developed for him when in fact it does not. If you would take a look, you would see that the code in Connolly's site differs from the code in any version of Mambo. "
What do they have against dancers? ..What? This isnt cuba? I gotta go
It's easier to fight for one's principles than to live up to them.
Right off the Mambo front page:
Moments later, after a few refreshes: "This site is temporarily unavailable. Please notify the System Administrator."
parasight.de
... if I had mod points right now.
The NewsForge article is so bipartite structured such that it gives Connolly's view, then Emir Sakic's view. There is no formal introduction nor conclusion. If you start reading and bail out, you'll think the article is entirely pro-Connolly. If you read towards all the way to end, you'll get a much better perspective.
To pull our heads away from the heat, if this story was never /.'ed, Connolly and his Furthermore would probably never be heard (NewsForge said he was "far from being the pioneer in this industry"). Now he's given much more publicity than he could never earn if he had not hyped up the issue.
I once had a signature.
If you are presently using the software application "Mambo OS" in any release post October 3, 2003, you and your organization are potentially exposed to CIVIL LITIGATION and possibly CRIMINAL PROSECUTION.
:-)
If people/companies can be sued for just using software then our legal system would be in worse shape than it is today.
I've had this argument time and time again with people online. Just by USING something doesn't make you guilty of breaking the law. If I contributed however, well, that's another story altogether.
For example, if I put something into the New York Times that I didn't have business submitting then sure I'm liable. If I merely purchased a copy of the paper and read it then I'm not liable.
Our courts might be messed up but they are not stupid
Has Comcast disconnected your Internet account? Same here. You can read about it at http://comcastissue.blogspot.com
How a BSD license would have been better in this situation?
From what I can see here the issue has nothing to do with the license.
Perhaps, if the code was closed source, they would not have been able to use/modify Mambo in the first place.
They would have to develop their own software...
Not quite.
You can get the source code to Darwin, which is the BSD OS that underlies Mac OSX. The Aqua GUI itself is not derived from BSD - but you can still get all the BSD derived stuff for OSX in source form. Apple did not close up the BSD code they used.
Oolite: Elite-like game. For Mac, Linux and Windows
yeah, because apple is the poster boy for "share and share alike".
note that i am posting this from a powerbook, so save the apple-hater responses.
scott king
Gates has set back the cause of quality proprietary software by 20 years with his viral-like Microsoft EULA, which infects everything it comes into contact with.
Notice that Apple based their OS around the Darwin kernel, precisely because of the major problems inherant in the Microsoft EULA.
How can we (the closed source community) ever hope to be taken seriously by the people with the big bucks (Fortune 500 corportations and governments) when our main software license imposes so many unreasonable restrictions? It's time to kill the Microsoft EULA.
/rant ON
/rant OFF
Am I the only one that is fucking sick and tired of everyone arguing about who owns what IP and all the law suits.
Make it all free.. to hell with the lawyers and IP/copyright law. Its slowly dragging society down and making millionaires out of people that don't deserve it, while restricting freedoms of the common citizen.
Ok. rant over... move along now.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
IANAL, but this seems like a very simple dispute to settle.
Mr. Connolly's dispute is with Mr. Sakic. When you pay someone to do creative work for you, you do not necessarily transfer ownership of the copyright with it. First things first, Mr. Connolly must produce a contract that transfers the copyright to him. If he has no such contract, he has no case what-so-ever because he doesn't own the code.
Secondly, with such a contract, he must show that the code in Mambo actually infringes on his copyright. Without such proof, he has no case what-so-ever because there is no infringement.
Now, again IANAL, but if Mr. Connolly were to be able to prove both of these things, restitution must come from Mr. Sakic, not from some innocent bystander. The *users* of Mambo are *not* in violation of any copyright law. As an example, it is not infringement of copyright for me to listen to a copy of a song -- only to *copy* it.
The Mambo team *might* also be infringing since they distribute Mambo. However, I am willing to bet dollars to doughnuts that no court in the world would hear a case against Mambo without resolution of a case against Mr. Sakic. If Mr. Connolly makes no move to sue Mr. Sakic, I believe they are pretty much safe to ignore him (Note: this is not legal advice as I am in no way qualified to give advice).
Now, if Mr. Connolly instead argues that the code modification is a trade secret, then he also only has a case against Mr. Sakic. Once a trade secret has been released, it is no longer a trade secret. He may indeed have a case against Mr. Sakic in this area (though I highly doubt it), but no one else is at risk.
So in summary, Mr. Connolly should sue Mr. Sakic if he has a legitimate grievance. Until that issue is settled, he would be wise to keep his mouth shut.
In my personal opinion, if you hire a free software programmer to modify a GPL piece of software, it is *your* responsibility to explain *very clearly* that you do not want the changes distributed. Distribution of modified GPL code is the norm. If you do not explain this I think you will have a hard time convincing anyone that the programmer should have known better.
Seriously, why can't there be a single Slashdot article that has the links in sane places?
;p
When 'Newsforge' is linked, I expect the link to go to the index page of Newsforge. Why don't you link 'the article'? There are far more and far worse examples in the other stories.
Is this some conspiracy to get your story posted? Do subscribers get sane links?
follow me on Twitter: http://twitter.com/moeffju
it has the default latin entries of a portal site that hasn't really been populated with content. Do Mambo users have to fear litigation from a guy who can't even take care of his own site???
Whoever moderated this as flamebait is some kind of idiot. Of course, I shouldn't be surprised, after all this is slashdot. Gentle reminder people, the 'freedom' that RMS and his ilk so venerate is based on freedom of speech, the idea that software itself is a protected form of speech under the constitution.
Whatever happened to "I may not agree with what you say, but I'll defend to the death your right to say it."
The reason that there is a small but growing backlash against the FSF and its poster-child, the GPL, is the quasi-religion that caused this moderater to mod-down this perfectly honest opinion.
I find it hilarious that people posting on slashdot decry the 'Micrososft Monoculture' and yet rush headlong towards creating their own little monoculture where dissenting opinion is quashed mercilessly. Being a GPL zealot doesn't make you some 'better' kind of zealot, sane people still pile you in with all the other idiots and crazies.
"That naive cube! How long must I suffer this!" --Sheldon J. Plankton
In BSD-style licenses there is no incentive or legal necessity for anyone, including (big) corporations, to give back anything for what they take.
This is parasitic behavior and is not constructive to the whole software ecosystem. GPL is way better in the sense that the modifications must flow back to the community, thus ensuring a healthy and thriving ecosystem for as long as the software is used by anyone.
As the source is available and will always be available, the fittest of the software species (most users, most utility for users) will evolve even more to be "the perfect tool". The availability of the source guarantees the most eyeballs and the developers interested in that software. Just getting a closed source product derived from a BSD-licensed software is of little joy to a user/programmer who needs a certain functionality, or wants to fix a certain bug.
Giving back to the community is vitality for the software. If giving back stops, the process which renews the software is lessened or dies altogether. This can not be good for the software.
Hope you like this rational discourse.
I do not moderate.
It seems that we have 2 parties here who both don't understand a thing of what they are talkign about.
1. When you do not have a right to use certain code, still using it and distributing it with a GPL license still doesn't bring this code under the GPL. The GPL is pretty clear about that.
This means that the Mamba team seems to be wrong, regardless of if the code was partially derived from their project or not, it includes code to which the person who put it under the GPL had no right to use.
That said, the trade secret story is utter bullshit.
First of all, using a trade secret to gain a competative advantage is not only legal, it is THE reason for them to exist.
Stealing a trade secret is first of all a breach of contract, second, it can be a crime.
This is an issue between tge supposed owners of the code and the person who leaked it. No other peopel are involved, they are not part of the contract, and had no reason to believe this code was supposed to be a trade secret.
So.. they have a case against their developer, not againstr any end-user, and it is already doubtfull they have any case with regards to Mamba. If a secret is out, it is no longer a secret, and there the story really ends.
If the original code was derived from the Mamba project then the owners of that code may have to release it as GPL if they distribute it. It is not clear to me from the article if the original code was indeed derived from the Mamba project, but if so, then that eliminates any possible case against the Mamba team as well (a case which would not be able to go beyond fixing the damage at any rate)
Well that sounds like it is the developers problem.
If you develop closed source software based on GPL it is YOUR FAULT for not reading and understanding the license. If you feel that it's unfair, don't use the code. You can either find something with a BSD style license or *gasp* code it from scratch.
It's obvious to anyone that this scenario could easily have been avoided. The issue here is the restrictive nature of the GPL. Had this code been released under the more flexible and free BSD license, none of these issues would arise.
WRONG.
The issue here is that Connolly claims Sakic inserted code under a restrictive licence into a GPL program without the copyright holder's permission. Replace "GPL" with "BSD", and the argument made by Connolly is the same, regardless of its legal backing.
At most, the only additional right Sakic would have if Mambo were BSD would be the ability to relicence Mambo code into a proprietary program whether or not he is the original author; credit need only be given. Under the GPL, Sakic would have to be the original author in order to relicence the code.
However, Connolly's argument arises from the appearance of similar functionality in Mambo after it was added to his own proprietary program. He claims the code was lifted from the modifications made by Sakic; the programmer says he reimplemented the functionality in a clean situation. BSD or GPL, Connolly would still argue that Sakic had no right to contribute the code to Mambo that was written for Furthermore and licenced under tight restrictions. BSD or GPL, Sakic would still argue that he rewrote entirely new code for Mambo.
Connolly still got his damn code in the first place, and since he isn't distributing it, the GPL as it applies to Furthermore is dormant (recall that the code Sakic modified for Furthermore was under the GPL). The GPL would only kick in if Connolly distributes Furthermore and if Sakic was not the original author, and thus would have had had no right to relicence the Mambo code.
Now, get off your soapbox.
Someday, you're going to die. Get over it.
I'm right in the middle of "doing anything you want" there, and didn't want to be interrupted.
you are clearly misunderstanding what FUD is, you say:
he different is that FUD - fear, uncertainty, doubt - can in fact be grounded in reality
as the previous responses have indicated with their links to the definition, which I will repeat, FUD is a technical term for disinformation that is intended to inspire fear, uncertainty, and doubt. If it's grounded in reality, it is by definition not FUD. I hate these MOD PARENT X posts, but you just cannot get away with saying something that blatantly misinformed.
If there was no copyright agreement between Emir Sakic and Connolly, then the code that Emir Sakic wrote belongs to Sakic. Everything else here is irrelevant. However, it's unclear to me why Sakic would be asking Connolly to put it under GPL. Did Sakic not know that he still owned the code?
There seem to be a lot of misunderstandings. I bothered to read the article, the responses (they both added comments to the Newsforge article), and some of the messages posted.
Some people seem to think that because Mambo is GPL, the code modifications must be released under the GPL. This is only true if Connolly distributes his application. If he keeps the code "within his walls" then he can keep his code changes private. When Emir put the code out there, that violated the GPL which allows Connolly to keep the code to himself in this special case. OK? So Connolly isn't a 100% whack-job.
But the next misunderstanding is on Connolly's part: his code is NOT in the Mambo codebase! Emir re-implemented the code, and gave it extra functionality. So the whole first misunderstanding is mostly irrelevant, because there is no copied code! And this is (I think) why Mambo keeps asking for more info and not getting it: if Connolly had to give line-by-line details of the violation, we would see that there is no line-by-line theft.
However, there is the third misunderstanding (or assumption). And that is that many people appear to assume that Emir clean-roomed this. He didn't. From everything I've read, Emir got sneaky: he liked the feature, he wanted it in Mambo, so he took the code he already wrote for Connolly, and tweaked the shit out of it so it looked different and better. And it really is different and better, but it's built right off what he had already done for Connolly. I don't know what to think about this part -- there is no law I know of that would address this clearly. It probably exists, but I don't know of it. And so I'm left thinking that Connolly is completely out of luck and has absolutely no case at ALL, but Emir behaved terribly, and I wouldn't want such a person working on my codebase.
My Greasemonkey scripts for Digg &
FUDL? fear, uncertainty, doubt and litigation?
then innocent users can be be-FUDLed.
(groan)
This is truly "nothing to see folks, move on" sort of material. It's known in the anti-spam circles as a "cartooney", i.e. a ridiculous and amateurish legal threat not made by an actual lawyer.
If Mister Connolly decides his pathetic little rants are worth spending money to hire a lawyer on, then it might be deserving of attention. Right now, he's just another kook demanding attention.
I'm afraid this problem will always be with us. The Intellectual Property can of worms is open. People who are trying to make progress and get things done will continually be harrassed by whining crybabies who insist that since you blew up the football in their yard, it's their air and you can't play with it, stamp, stamp, clench fists, I'll tell my mommy on you.
I guess it's like ants at a picnic or rain after you wash the car. Just part of the environment we live in.
Sigh.
So this guy took Mambo and added what sounds like a trivial piece of code (allow a story to show up on all pages).
I can see him maybe getting pissed for not being credited or them using his non-released code without permission.
But all he did was slightly modify a GPL project. Which makes his derivative modifications GPL as per the license. So even if he was planning on selling his "improved" mambo. They would be allowed to use the code anyway since he would have to release it, and makes his whole case moot.
Pretty lame that he thinks he can take a huge open source project developed by many people and then add a few lines of code and think it's something new and innovative.
You want to write your own proprietary system. Go ahead. Write your own! If you don't want to contribute to OSS then don't write code based on it.
Not talented or motivated enough to make an original product? Change somebody else's and claim it as your own!
No, the whole POINT of the GPL is to prevent people from doing things like this. The problem is that people either dont understand that, or ignore it.
People who release their code as GPL dont *WANT* other companies or organizations to take it and use it in their 'secret' programs. If they want to base a product on GPL'd code, they damn well have to release all their mods back to the original authors/community.
The desired end result is more GPL code, and less locked up proprietary code that no one can see.
Note that the GPL doesnt restrict you from *USING* the program (eg running it, having it do whatever it does), it only restricts you from modifying the source code to such a program and then claiming the result as your own - this is specifically what authors of GPL code want to prohibit - this is the terms under which the code is license for anything other than plain compiling and running as-is.
MS licence (and most proprietary software licenses) says 'you dont get to see the code, you sure as hell dont get to modify the code, and we even restrict how you use the compiled binary, and you have to pay us $$$ if you want to run it on more than one CPU'
GPL says 'you can compile this code, and use the program for its purpose to accomplish its designed task or any other task you can use it for, on as many CPU's as you want. You can even make copies and give them away. You can see the code. You can even modify the code. But if you take your modified program and distribute it to other people you *MUST* distrubute that code, and your modifications, under the GPL'
Proprietary licenses dont restrict how you can redistribute, original or modified copies, becuase they dont allow you to redistribute or modify *AT ALL*.
Unreasonable?? Isn't it every creator's own choice what license he wants his work to be distributed under?
To me it is entirely reasonable.
After all he gives it away without asking for any monetary reward, so asking (GPL=expecting/demanding) the reciprocal should not upset anyone that uses this work.
"The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
The Furthermore website's donate page wouldn't accept my contribution of -$1000!!
Man that sucks.
Does anyone have a link to the patch and the tracker entry documenting its inclusion into the source? If only nine lines of code were changed, and they weren't changed since then the initial patch, then it should be trivial to re-implement it using only the requirements as a guide.
Heck, I'd do it just to learn about Mambo and its source. (I wasn't aware of it before this article). Why go through all this pain over nine lines of code?
It is impossible to enjoy idling thoroughly unless one has plenty of work to do.
- Jerome Klapka Jerome
But as BSD is at least as good (as far as the core OS go's) why would a reasonable person who has a mortgage to pay begin a venture with the GPL around his neck? Remember this is'nt the 'creator' of the code but the owner of the problem.
It would have been unreasonable for apple to have built OSX on GPL code.
At some point every programmer has to earn a living.
At some point some programmers actually become basically competent.
At some point some of these actually become truely competent in some particular task.
What order of these events vary. Many reach the third point more then once. Many reach the first but never reach the second. As having competent programmers review your code improves your chances of becoming competent open source projects do improve the programming community. Which points out how bad it is when the incompetents reach mentoring level (commercially or in open source), they pass on (or demand) bad practices.
But at the end of your carrier most of the competent amoung you will be developing for a living. Many of the incompenent amoung you will also be 'developing' for a living. Very few have the energy to write code for fun/accolades past their teens/early twentys. Only a tiny number get paid to write GPL code.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
Does anyone else think this might be some sort of lover's spat?
Both Connolly and the developer should have had a contract in place for who owned the resulting (if any) IP. However, since Connolly *paid* for that code, I assume that give him the IP anyway.
The developer and Mambo's posts (as well as the posts of many slashdotters) have shown that they are wholly ignorant of the terms of the GPL. As soon as they found out that someone had put proprietary code (whether it had been derived from GPL is irrelevant in this context RTFL) in their code base they should have removed it.
In this case it is a little bit iffy whether the code is owned by Connolly, because it is not the exact same code (not copy pasted) written into his in house version of mambo. This is really the sort of question the Mambo folks should be asking an IP lawyer. Instead, they seem rather eager to get involved in a little crusade for open source against big evil Connolly.
Anyway, I think that this entire incident highlights how little most people know about the GPL. Most people seem to assume that it is whatever they want it to be. Check it out at "http://www.opensource.org/licenses/". Personally, I have always preferred the MIT, or BSD licenses due to how small and clear they are. The GPL, on the other hand, is about the size of most EULAs.
Although the contractor's legal standing in this matter likely tilts in his favor, his behaviour in the matter does not pass the smell test.
If the guy was paid to design and write code for Mr. Connelly, he should give it to Mr. Connelly. Any subsequent use of it, or the ideas, should be done with Mr. Connelly's permission. If Mr. Connelly has responsibilities with respect to the GPL, give him the opportunity to fulfill them.
Come on. Let's lose this "gimme" hacker's mentality, and take the moral high ground. Let's do things because they are the right thing to do. I would like to think that the Open Source world is populated by gentlemen.
but don't be confused that FUD is necessarily an evil thing
Just because marketers and advertisers don't operate by a 'limited' moral standard doesn't mean that it's okay.
Truth and openess are good things, FUD is bad. The world is what we make it.
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
I have dealt with Brain Connolly personally, on a number of occasions. He is an extremely abusive man. My professional opinion is that he fished Mambo developers for a way to gain financial or media gains by exploiting their talents. He has a media network that fell for his story hook-line-and-sinker, as he has used the media extensively during his attack on Mambo.
Any respectable journalist should due their due diligence on Brain Connolly, and they will find that his company "Furthermore" is nothing more than a web site set up to accomplish his goals of exploitation on the open source movement, specifically Mambo.
There are loopholes in the law regarding open source software that Brain Connelly is trying to exploit for his own gains. Do not fall for it. His motives are foul, and the developers of Mambo are the target.
I am leaving my identity anonymous, as Brain Connelly is a dirty fighter, and I am choosing to protect myself from further assault from him.
Best Regards... and don't be fooled by a fool.
Be aware, however, that -- even though this would be far less viral than most proprietary EULAs, it steps onto ground that I think the FSF avoided for a reason.
Sometimes boldness is in fashion. Sometimes only the brave will be bold.
or zombo code?
Me email iz skyewalkerluke at microsoft's free email service.
Mambo is just a forked version of phpnuke.
Checkout the bunch of security holes posted on bugtraq security mailing list over the years about mambo open source, then compare them with phpnuke. interesting eh?
Brian Connolly has been involved in several FOSS projects. He has had several run ins with developers over his abrasive style. Google will find some classic examples of his style.
Connolly has a habit of offering to pay developers for custom code, then becoming quite unreasonable as the work progresses.
Be on the look out for literati if your project is on sf.net, this story suggests you are likely to burnt. http://sourceforge.net/users/literati/
From the various postings, a picture is emerging that Connolly hired a developer to add some functionality to Mambo. After finishing his job for Connolly, that same developer also implemented the same functionality for Mambo again.
If that's what happened, the developer behaved rather unprofessionally: if someone pays you good money to implement his idea, you don't re-implement it open source right away, whether you can legally do so or not, and whether you judge the idea to be "trivial" or not. Furthermore, Connolly may be right that his idea was under trade secret protection.
Where Connolly is wrong is trying to hold the Mambo project and its users responsible. It seems likely that the trade secret violation is only a matter between Connolly and the developer, in particular since Connolly also put the modified source code up on his own web site, and that Connolly has lost all trade secret protection (the idea may not have enjoyed trade secret protection anyway because it would have been obvious once he used it on his site). And once Connolly distributed the modified code, he accepted the terms of the GPL.
What should people do? Whether the Mambo project chooses to force the issue over the GPL is one decision. But it seems to me that the Mambo developer in question should return his payment to Connolly, whether he is legally obligated or not. The Mambo project should probably also just separate themselves from the developer, or at the very least make it crystal clear that he acted with poor judgement.
More generally, this is just another reminder that open source projects need to get their act together on doing the paperwork on accepting code contributions. And a specific policy (and possibly sample contracts) for core team members doing custom programming involving the project couldn't hurt either.
In the end, it seems to me that all three parties involved, Connolly, the Mambo project, and the developer, screwed up in various ways.
Massachusetts courts have held that e-mail (signed with your name in plain text) is a binding contract. It's certainly more binding than a verbal contract, which courts will also uphold if there are witnesses.
:-)]
It does have to be signed. [Do you put your name in a tag line?
An engineer who ran for Congress. http://herbrobinson.us
Part of the problem with this debate is that everyone is commenting on this without being in possession of the full facts... so to be absolutely clear.
/. they'd arrange for it to go on public display.
1. Connolly kicked this all off at the end of August by e-mailing his 'open letter' with threats of litigation to a number of Mambo users using the e-mail facility in Mambo's official forum.
For all his talk of litigation, he very quickly switched to regaling forum members about 'the court of public opinion' - in other words his threats of litigation are nothing more than hype.
He's had so many 'so sue me' replies by now that we're all wondering when he's going to put his money where his mouth is and get started as we're all looking forward to the prospect of putting him into the bankruptcy courts.
2. Despite Connolly's claims to have had a contract with Emir Sakic containing an assignment of copyright to Furthermore, no has ever seen this contract.
Sakic denies that it ever existed.
Mambo's dev team and Miro's legal team have asked for a copy and got nothing.
Numerous Mambo users have asked the same, challenging Connolly to upload a scanned copy of the contract to the forum at mambers.com or send it by e-mail - still nothing
Even John Weathersby's (OSSI) comments on Newsforge make it clear that Connolly has offer no evidence to support his claims to having had a contract.
Why hasn't he simply forwarded this contract and proved its exists?
Because it doesn't?
3. Sakic has stated clearly that the code used on Connolly's site is not the code used in Mambo and never has been.
Sakic may have used the idea for the lead story block put forward by Connolly but unless that was protected by an NDA or Connolly holds a patent on this idea, then copyright offers no protection at all - and lets faces with the amount of 'prior art' for lead story blocks, Connolly's got no chance of successfully obtaining a patent.
Connolly may have made no effort to verify whether the code he claims as his is still in use, but many others have and can confirm that none of it is used in Mambo at all.
4. Connolly claims that 'his' version of Mambo has been 'stolen' directly from his site after the appearance of an article about it on LinuxWorld a couple of months back - The article, BTW, is a puff piece written by one of his associates.
Why in the blue hell would anyone bother to go to the trouble of hacking into his server to get this software, when Mambo is freely available for download from numoerous other places.
5. Connolly has told Newsforge that he wants no 'special control' over Mambo.
So why did he demand that he be given the right to prevent anyone from using Mambo if he took the view that their site was in competition with him?
Connolly's whole 'case' is built on lies, fabrications and an unwillingness to obtain even a rudimentary understanding of copyright as anyone who's dealt with him over the last couple of weeks will very quickly.
I see he's been on here, running off at the mouth, so yet again I find myself posting the same challenge to him.
Put up or shut up!
Brian, you claim this code is still in use? Then show me the code.
You claim to have had a contract with Emir Sakic - prove that is exists - I'm sure if you were to send a scanned copy to the admins at
You claim that mambo users are liable for civil and criminal action - go ahead and file suit... my lawyer is eagerly awaiting the paperwork.
Come on, Brian - just do it and put your claims to a proper test of their veracity - anything less simply proves you to be a liar.
I was wondering if you can sue back... If your currently developing a web site which uses the mambo code in your project and this open threat to development costs you money because you have to redesign a website from the ground up to avoid legal issues costing you time and money so that you can add all the features back in. can you sue the guy if his case turns out not to hold water? I am tired of these people going after communities of web developers because they sneak 5 lines of html into an open source project. Anyone who slanders(or liable I forget which is correct term) a project and or projects and threatens to sue them but doesnt should be sued... ie if SCO case fails then all the users of linux should be able to sue sco for damages to their linux based business... if these people choose to try these types of cases in view of public light rather than in court then everyone in that community should sue back when the case does not hold ground. if we dont then we the open source community set a very bad precedent... The method: 1.get someone to sell you code that is put in open source projects 2.sue all users of open source project code 3.ask for money without proof 4.hire a lawyer at 50% commission on all money collected 5. ask for donations on your web site for your case(mabye sco will pay him) 6. if you have to goto court drag it out for 2 years so that you can keep collecting money from people as you go 7. if you lose just pay the lawyer fees and minor damages of the other person in that one case... 8. Horray you just got 10 million for code that cost $1000 bucks to produce and 5 minutes time... The only real way to scare people away from this is to set a few examples. We need 1000 lawsuits against this guy for having to develop new biz models and software etc... The people who play this game need to learn that they lose far more for nonsense complaints then they can gain. the only group who normally handles cases in these matters has been the eff www.eff.org we need way more than one case. we need 100 cases. or 10000 cases... can you sue someone seperately and not be forced to join a class action suit?
Rather than blather incessantly about whether or not the claim is valid, we have forced the issue by sending the following to Furthermore this morning via e-mail:
Quote:
ThisCanada.com Inc. is a user of the Mambo Open Source application and version referred to in your September 15th letter at your www.furthermore.com site.
Our site, www.thiscanada.com, may possibly use code referenced in your letter.
We have no intention of modifying the software used.
We await your legal action.
Sincerely,
Erik Sorenson
Vice-President
ThisCanada.com Inc.
End Quote.
We will see what Furthermore is made of.