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Alleged GPL Violation Spurs Accusations, Lawsuit
lisah writes "Linux.com is reporting that Alexander Maryanovsky, the developer of Jin (a Java-based chess client), has filed a lawsuit alleging that International Chess University has violated several aspects of the GNU General Public License (GPL). Maryanovsky claims that the online chess training website and its CEO, Alexander Rabinovitch, are in violation of both his copyright and the GPL by distributing software that is based on Jin. According to the report, though Rabinovitch is dismissing most of the claims leveled against him, he has apparently left his native Israel for Canada and declines to give his exact whereabouts." Newsforge and Slashdot are both owned by OSTG.
This Story has already been posted on Slashdot.
GPL Gets Its Day in Court in Israel
echo YOUR_OPINION >
Newsforge and Slashdot are both owned by OSTG.
Yes, they are, but we don't feel the need to point out that fact constantly.
Now, if you mentioned that Linux.com and Slashdot are both owned by OSTG, that would be a relevant disclosure statement. I'm suprised no one mentioned it.
The source code is made available to both parties during discovery. Technically, the plaintiff has to ask the court to make it available, but since there isn't a way to investigate/litigate the matter without doing so the judge will almost certainly order the defendant to turn it over to the plaintiff for examination.
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According to the latest ruleset, this post should be modded as Vorpal Flamebait +5.
The whole socket thing is meant for something else. Staying in the realm of chess, there's a generic chess protocol that is used to interface engines with clients. If you have a server and a client communicating over such a generic protocol, and one of them is distributed under GPL, it doesn't mean that the other one also has to be GPL, because neither is a derived work of the other (again, IANAL).
Finally, regarding EULA - GPL is not a EULA. He can distribute the binary client under a restrictive license, but he has to provide the sources under GPL. Rabinovitch seems to be in non-compliance here as well.
The Raven
Having read the article, it seems that it really comes down to this: The IChessU client connects to Jin through sockets, and Maryanovsky claims that the intimacy of this connection makes the two programs one. Thus, the code for the IChessU client must be published. Rabinovitch says this isn't so, they are two separate things. But what it really comes down to is, once again, the Open Source people don't like the fact that someone is using GPL'd code to make money without "giving back" even when there is no real violation of the GPL. It's a loophole for sure, but it's there and it's not a secret. If Maryanovsky wanted to have more control over the use of his code, he should have chosen a different license.
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
And in its own bizarre manner /. admits the RIAA has a point.
Leaving aside the point that there exists more than one person on Slashdot, it's notable that on software piracy threads, far more people tend to be against the idea of people profiting from copyright infringement, or doing so in a commercial context in some way. So this isn't connected to the RIAA suing grannies for downloading stuff to listen to.
No, the average Slashdot is miffed that the can't "share" theri freinds (anonymous people on the internet = freinds in their world) music, software, etc. The think that because someone, somewhere, paid $14.99 for a CD, the artist has been compensated, along with everybody in between. They fail to see that the cost to reproduce that 1 CD does not equal the "production costs".
While the RIAA are generally shortsighted idiots (I've worked with them before), the average Slashdotter is a bigger idiot who doesn't grasp that if artists can't eat, they can't produce art.
You misunderstand me. The GPL is a grant of rights, not a restriction. It's not 'less restrictive', since it's not restrictive at all. What restricts you is copyright law. It's impossible to be sued, at least in the US, for breaching the GPL. The restrictions all come from copyright law, and if you breach the GPL, you'll be sued for a breach of copyright.
Compared to the extreme permissive licenses like the MIT or BSD licenses, the GPL lifts less of the restrictions placed by copyright law, though. You don't get the right to restore the copyright law restrictions that the GPL lifted, for one. It also lets copyright law bar you from distributing binary-only copies in order to make it impractical to modify the software.
While there are plenty of good reasons why people might prefer thoes licenses, it strikes me that bitching about not having those rights, in the name of freedom, is a bit like a southern US plantation owner complaining about the loss of his freedom to own slaves...
However, things might be totally different in Brazil.
Indeed they are: here, some "independent" labels (aka, not the big ones) somehow manage to sell a CD for ONE THIRD of big label's price. Unfortunately for us, there are few of those and most artists are more easily seducted by big labels.
Regarding radio, it's really not a choice. Commercial radios nowadays only play "recent" music (aka music whose label payed fat payola). And usually their selection sucks big time (IMO).
And no, Brazilians are not required to use Orkut, it is just that this specific (and rather, limited) social networking site somehow spread like wildfire here. This "brazilian invasion" already happened before with fotolog for some unknown reason, when Brazilian's behaviour there brought fotolog to their knees with bandwidth cost. Nowadays fotolog impose series of limitations on the service usage.
I'm not defending piracy, but I feel there are some economic reasons pushing people for it. I propose that, removing big label's (along with payola) from this equation, there would be almost none piracy.
Koan: Imagine a dead artist. Am I "stealing" from this artist when I choose pirate music over a legal CD?
[Rabinovich] now points to online articles that he believes supports his position, such as Eric Schnell's and Jason Rumney's blogs.
Eric Schnell got the whole thing backwards. He thinks that Jin has an A/V module, which IChessU decided not to use and thus do not publish its source code. From his blog:
From I can make out, Jin's creator Alexander Maryanovsky's problem with IChessU is that while IChessU has utilized Jin's code, they are not distributing Jin's entire source code. An A/V module in Jin is not being used by IChessU and therefore the source code is not included.
I've tried to respond to his blog, but his captcha seems to be broken. I've emailed him but got no response so far.
I couldn't find anything related on Jason Rumney's blog, even with a google search.
"All the articles were produced only by Maryanovsky people/fans," [Rabinovich] says, "which is fine because they are published in developer's magazines/sites..
Where would Rabinovich have GPL violation related articles posted? A cooking magazine? Are Slashdot, Yediot Ahronot and Arstechnica all my fans? I didn't know I was that popular.
"He also said," Maryanovsky writes, "that they are planning to wrap Jin in a layer that would allow it to be controlled via a socket. I told [Rabinovitch] that I believe this would still, most likely, be violating the GPL." Despite this opinion, IChessU proceeded with its plan [snip]
That's wrong. As I mention on my page, they abandonded that idea and proceeded to use Jin in a straightforward manner.
Rabinovitch, however, writes [snip] The guy is hurt
Gee, I wonder why I'd be hurt? Could it be because Rabinovich stole my work?
Rabinovitch rejects the charge of bad faith negotiations because it is made without any explanation or evidence.
As I explained to him in my response, there's was no need to explain anything or bring evidence. The letter was to him - he already knows all the evidence! He was there at the negotiations!
Writing to NewsForge, Rabinovitch states that all source code was posted to the IChessU site, including that for the audio-visual module -- a claim that cannot be substantiated, since all code has now been removed from the IChessU site. He characterizes the audio/voice module as a separate program that "has nothing in common with the original Jin (it is even written in a different computer language!).".
So if the source code to the A/V module was released under the GPL, as required, why argue that it's a separate program? Not that it makes any difference, as that is exactly the point of the GPL - even unrelated code becomes "infected", as long as it's part of the same application. If I didn't want unrelated code infected, I'd release Jin under the LGPL. That is the whole difference between the GPL and the LGPL!
What if we integrated into Jin a Microsoft Word button -- would Mr. Maryanovsky then claim that we should publish the Microsoft source code as well?
No, I would then claim that they cannot publish the resulting application at all, as the GPL clearly states:
If you cannot distribute so as to satisfy simultaneously your obligations under this License and any other pertinent obligations, then as a consequence you may not distribute the Program at all.
As has been pointed out many times - you do not have any rights to a GPLed application except for the rights that the GPL gives you. The GPL does not give you the right to add a "Microsoft Word button" to Jin (excep