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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.
Naw, that'd be a BSD-style license, not a GPL :)
Quoted from the article:
Pleading lack of time, Maryanovsky suggested that IChessU could either use Jin or pay him $4,000 for a commercial license instead.
So there was an unrestricted commercial license available for $4,000 and instead they took the GPL version and violated its distribution license. If the accusations about license violation are true, this is just as much piracy as selling illegal versions of Windows or any other software.
And in its own bizarre manner /. admits the RIAA has a point.
Do not try to read the dupe, thats impossible. Instead, only try to realize the truth
What truth?
There is no dupe
Not if it's still got the easter eggs.
Goten Xiao
Not to go too far down this path but I think the _average_ /.er is more miffed with the process the RIAA is using rather than that they are suing. The flood of Jon Doe suits are absurd. They should have to file one suit at a time based upon better evedence than they currently have been using.
/. crowd has about this.
Then again AFAIK no suit has gone all the way to trial, another beef the
-nB
whois gawk date unzip strip find touch finger mount join nice man top fsck grep eject more yes exit umount sleep dump
Exactly, dude. That's what copyright law is for.
Though your sense of entitlement seems to be a tad overwhelming.
The GPL is a license that grants users far more rights than copyright law would normally allow. The alleged infringer here was in no sense restricted by the GPL; it gave him a bunch of rights that he had under certain conditions, and that he wouldn't otherwise have had under copyright law, and he is alleged to have broken those conditions while exercising the rights.
If your uncle lets you live in his house rent-free as long as you don't have any pets, then he is entitled to use the law to evict you and your ferret when he finds out you've breached the terms. Bitching about it just makes you look like a spoiled brat.
If you want to complain about restrictions in software licenses, try some proprietary licenses which bind you under contractual terms that force you to give up MORE rights than the ones that copyright law takes away from you. You're not allowed to reverse engineer Windows or sue Microsoft, for example, if you use their software.
Wild guess - you're stirring up the GPL vs BSD debate, aren't you? You're pushing the gambit that the GPL is not actually free while the BSD license is. Unfortunately - the BSD license is also restrictive. So shall we just jump to the logical conclusion and call for releasing all code to the Public Domain?
Of course - that completely ignores the reasons behind the GPL and BSD licenses. But hey - let's not bother with such complexity.
"Linking" is a well-understood term-of-art in comptuer science and "talking through socket" doesn't qualify.
Sounds to me like Rabinovitch could answer Maryanovsky's objections by distributing source to the Jin-plus-sockets-adapter and source to a do-nothing socket-plugin to replace his chat application (without performing its chat function). That would make the modified Jin compile and run from the supplied sources - as Jin - without the proprietary code.
(It would also provide a skeleton in case somebody else wanted to build an open-source chat plugin that connects to Jin via Rabinovitch's mods.)
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Bull. From the article:
If this account is accurate - there has never been an issue with Jin being used for commercial interests. Granted - there are a contingent of folks who just don't understand that the GPL has little to do with commercial use of licensed code. I've met folks who bristle about "paying for Linux" or other such complaints. This does not seem to be the case at all. If Jin was used as the client-of-choice for the IChessU service without modification then there would be no issue. And your point would be valid.
IChessU use of sockets is an interesting point. You might have a valid point claiming Maryonovsky can't have issue with this. In doing so, you've clearly decided to dismiss the various details of this. The reader might want to look in to it a bit more.
Of course - there are more issues in the case. You're also ignoring IChessU's client EULA.
I know its more fun to poke at the GPL. But you're being misleading.
How is anybody hurt by the commercialization of BSD-licensed code? First of all, the pre-fork code will still be available under the BSD license. So if the community wants to further develop it, that can happen without problem. Nobody is restricted from continuing the development.
The commercialized version may offer features that would not or could not have been developed for the open source version in a financially-viable way. Yes, sometimes it is in everyone's best interest for there to be commercial development of certain features. It is often the original developers of the BSD-licensed software who do such development, and thus they benefit financially.
Such commercialization often offers many jobs for engineers and developers. Take SunOS, which had its roots in BSD UNIX. It has allowed for many tens of thousands of people to hold jobs, not just at Sun, but at companies which use Sun systems.
Many times we see such commercial entities contribute code back to the open source version. This happend frequently with BSDI and FreeBSD. It is still happening today to some extent with Apple, FreeBSD, and NetBSD.
I know the GPL supporters have their ideological reasons for disliking the terms of the BSD license. But the fact remains that the BSD license does not have the restrictions of the GPL, and this is often a very beneficial thing, as it does allow for far easier commercialization. Such commercialization often leads to many jobs for developers, and in many cases directly benefits the open source projects from which the code was originally taken. It's actually the complete opposite of being harmful. The benefits are quite great.
No it doesn't! This was exactly the point which was being made. I can take GPL code and change it in any way I like and use that modified version and the GPL license imposes no conditions on me at all.
However, if I take my modified version of the code and pass (or sell) it on to someone else then the GPL kicks in. As soon as I distribute it I have to then release my modified code under the GPL.
There is no such thing as "a violation of the GPL". What these people have violated is copyright law.
In RMS's ideal world {and mine for that matter}, it would be law that every piece of software had to come with Source Code {this being necessary for the meaningful exercise of Freedoms One and Three}, either at the time it was obtained or anytime later on request; and failure to supply the Source Code on request would be punishable. Source Code isn't the only requirement, but we're simplifying a little here. Anyway, Freedoms Zero and Two can be taken by force if necessary; at the present time, it is orders of magnitude more difficult {though mathematically not impossible} to obtain Source Code by forcible techniques.
The GPL is a sort of "second best" approach, a way to approximate the ideal situation using existing laws.
Existing copyright law already says that if you want to distribute copies of something someone else originally made and which is still under protection of copyright, you usually need permission in writing from that person. The law actually gives you some limited right to make copies in the name of "fair dealing" or "fair use", which nothing can take away -- even if you promise not to exercise your statutory rights, you can go ahead and do so anyway without fear of repercussions. The other person is a sucker for believing in a worthless promise.
Now, if you have written a program and want people to use it, it's clear that you have to make some provision for distributing copies. This is where copyright law comes into play. If, as a fine upstanding citizen, you want to ensure the Four Freedoms for everyone who uses your program, then you can give permission to distribute copies of your program so long as they preserve the Four Freedoms for everyone who receives a copy from them.
The GPL is a letter of permission to do things above and beyond what the Law of the Land allows, on certain conditions. What it basically says is that: you get Freedom Zero whatever happens, and you get Freedom Two if and only if you don't seek to deny any subsequent recipient of the program from you any of the Four Freedoms. If you don't comply with the conditions of the GPL, then it doesn't give you any permission to do anything, and normal copyright law applies.
If you make a derivative work of a GPL program and don't show it to anyone else, then the Law of the land says you can do that: it's Fair Dealing. However, once you overstep the bounds of Fair Dealing, you require written permission. And the GPL only affords permission if you comply with certain conditions. If you do not comply with the conditions of the GPL, then you are in violation of copyright law.
Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!