Slashdot Mirror
PlayStation 2 Game ICO Violates the GPL
An anonymous reader writes "Apparently the video game ICO for the Playstation 2 is using GPL-licensed code from libarc. Sony could end up having to release the source code for the entire game!"
← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)
The key word in there is "could". I doubt anything will actually happen. Never underestimate the power of bureaucracy.
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
I'm kind of confused where you get the idea that they could have to release all of their source code. It doesn't seem to mention that in the link at all, also its very doubtful that sony would do that regardless. I could be missing something though so if thats the cause I apologize.
Isn't reverse engineering with the tools used in this article disallowed by the license agreement for the game? I know little about law, so who has the trump card here?
Now, the FSF, often acting on behalf of the copyright holders, have often allowed infringers to comply by releasing the source under the GPL. But I recall reading here at Slashdot recently that they are starting to play hardball with violators, and not allowing them to comply simply by shipping source. The copyright holder would be fully within his rights to get a permanent injunction against the sale of the game.
Request your free CD of my piano music.
Request your free CD of my piano music.
As numerous other posters have pointed out, this will not result in Sony having to release the source code for their game. The myth of the 'viral GPL' is already going strong enough without /. fuelling it by posting articles like this.
Oh well, time to sit back and watch the trolls have a field day...
Dealing with lawyers would be a lot less tedious if they all looked like Casey Novak.
Not true, that is the function of the LGPL, the GPL however has no such limitations. If you link part of a GPL library into your software, that software must be GPL. In effect you are actually including parts of the GPL code into your own program, and therefore this is viral. (And no, viral isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it is the best way to describe it)
Other code is covered by other licences. These licences most likely explicitely restrict them from releasing the code. The GPL doesn't superscede these other licences.
This is a simple case of copyright infringement. Sony will be obliged to pay damages, and possibly withdraw the game from sale.
I've always thought that knowing the origin of all code is standard procedure. Where I've worked, hiding such a thing is reason enough to fire someone.
Didn't they check? Or they knew perfectly well what they were doing but didn't care. I suppose it's the second.
They didn't care because they are incompetent? Or simply their lawyers told them it didn't matter. I suppose it's the second.
I think you are confusing the GPL with the LGPL. If a library is licensed under the GPL, the program that uses it is GPLed too. You have to link a library licensed under LGPL if you want to keep your software proprietary. That's exactly what the LGPL has been made for.
1) release the code for ICO under a GPL compatible license (and thereby conforming to the GPL)
2) license the library under different terms (might be difficult depending on the fact if all copyright holders agree to do this)
3) violate copyright (and thereby enter the usual legal road for copyright violations)
They don't have to release the code if they don't want to.
Arm chair lawyer alert! Slashdot, where programmers become legal vigilantes.
How do these libraries save time and money if you have to hire a lawyer first to see what you can actually do with it?
I have excellent Karma and I am not afraid to Troll it.
Looking at libarc website http://libarc.sourceforge.net/: the license indicated here isn't the GPL..
So either it's not the same libarc or its license has changed or the website is incorrect or the issue happen in some other file but not in libarc..
[ ] You understand what `implement' means.
The parent has no clue and is confusing the GPL with the LGPL.
"Copyright (C) 2000 Masanao Izumo "
I wish him all the best luck in chasing down Sony and enforcing his license. If this copyleft were held by FSF then maybe there would be some arm twisting.
(also making a library GPL instead of LGPL, how annoying)
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
If I were starting a business, I'd just go on and bright-line and outright abuse the GPL. I would go into business (such as PS2 games or whatever) where any "outrage" by the OSS community would go unnoticed and would simply ignore the empty threats of lawsuits and what-have-you. Heck, many companies are doing this already. it's a very legitimate and none too risky business strategy. For all its good philosophical points that would encourage good hearted individuals to contribute to my bottom line, I would benefit from the fact that enforcement of the GPL is ultimately toothless.
Please, do go on and tell me how, exactly, I'm wrong in this.
Don't distribute your work, in source or binaries. You're free to modify as you deem fit. But if you distribute to others, you're supposed to do so under the license. That's the terms of the GPL deal, you're free to reject them but usually the only alternative is not using the software.
But is the source code work of a single man something to be hoarded so? The GPL was also designed to protect your clients, who perhaps you only ship binaries to. Because someday the author might be a client, and wishes to receive the rights as well.
I Browse at +4 Flamebait
Open Source Sysadmin
Easy one: don't give your binaries to anybody, then you won't have to release your source code. Not joking, the GPL works that way.
OTOH, if you release your compiled code without the source, the authors of the GPL code you included COULD go after you, even if you "are one single person".
(This looks like IHBT, but anyway)...
Singularity: a belief in the "God" idea with the "demiurge" relation inverted.
I suspect its because you either are not a gamer, don't read gamer publications, or live under some sort of gamer rock. I am a mild to non gamer myself, and have heard of this game, though I have never seen it or played it nor was I sure what platform it was for or who had created it. Penny Arcade had several comics regarding it, and many times I've seen gamers nerdgasm over it's puzzles and gameplay on forums.
But yes, your point of "I don't care about this, so why should I care" is well taken.
So, you want to use some libraries, but don't want to pay for them?
Fair enough, but why stick to the GPL? There are a lot of high quality commercial licences you can pirate as well.
The reason you're safe is not that you're small fry -- the GPL says that if you distribute derivative programs or systems, these have to be under the same license. Personal use is not distribution.
Many web companies are thought to have been taking advantage of this for years. It is claimed that many of the web services we receive are based on in-house improvements of open source code. As their in-house version is never distributed, there is no requirement to distribute the source code (which would help their competitors.
If you wish to distribute something incorporating GPL/LGPL/[insert-name-of-license-here] code without adopting the license, you have to contact all named contributors in the version history for their permission (it is, after all, their work).
HAL.
Got them moderator blues I blieve I walk out the do', With these mod-points I been gettin', I 'most never post no mo'
The game is an excellent (but now dated) adventure/puzzle game (with minor action elements), that was something of a sleeper hit in the early-ish days of the PS2, before its software library became the unstoppable juggernaut it eventually turned into.
The basic concept of the game is that the player, who takes the role of a boy with horns, left in a mysterious castle as a sacrifice, must guide a mute girl around and eventually out of said castle, fighting against shadowy enemies and solving increasingly complicated puzzles. The game was notable for a number of reasons.
First, it had a striking visual and aural style. Unlike many early PS2 games, it turned away from bright colours and fancy coloured lighting effects, adopting a colour scheme that verged on monochrome at times, with a heavy emphasis on contrasting light and dark areas. The music was distinctly minimalist, but fitted the game well enough that the soundtrack went on to sell well in its own right.
The game-play was also notable. By contrast with the excess of button-mashing titles that dominated the PS2 scene at the time, Ico had a slower, more thoughtful pace. Combat elements were largely perfunctory - the real challenge was in defeating the puzzles posed by the game environment. In some respects, the gameplay had many parallels to that of the 3d Zelda games, although Ico placed higher degree of emphasis upon artistry than almost anything else around at the time on any platform. There was no enthusiastic voice-over urging you on to rack up big combo attacks, or to rush to the next objective before the bomb went off. Instead, the player experienced a mix of trepidation and a genuine sense of exploration as he made his way through the game world.
Ico never became a huge seller and never got a huge mainstream following. Nevertheless, it's an important part of gaming history. It was the first game to really use the power of its console generation to deliver something other than fancy special effects. It set new standards for story-telling, that remain influential even today. It spawned a "spiritual successor", in the form of "Shadow of the Colossus" (released relatively late in the PS2's life-cycle), which took many of Ico's concepts and developed them further, with greater technical expertise, to deliver an experience which was simultanously substantially flawed and deeply engaging.
So yes, we should care about Ico.
The key word is distribution, whatever you do with GPL'ed code is up to you, if you distribute it to others, with or without payment, you have to obey by the GPL by releasing the source. I.E. you can not sell/take credit for other ppl's work.
That depends on the validity of the license. In theory, at least, a license is only required if you want to do something that you wouldn't otherwise be allowed to do; for example, the GPL allows you to distribute software (otherwise a violation of copyright) if you follow its terms. So the question here is, is reverse engineering prohibited by law? If not, Sony can say "prohibited" all they want, but such terms would be legally meaningless--though, of course, they can still sue you and make you spend money to defend yourself.
This is all in my non-lawyerly opinion, of course.
License
Copyright © 2004 Basis Technology Corp.
All Rights Reserved.
Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions are met:
* Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
* Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.
* Neither the name of Basis Technology Corporation nor the names of its contributors may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software without specific prior written permission.
THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS AND CONTRIBUTORS "AS IS" AND ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE COPYRIGHT OWNER OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.
No mention to the GPLwhy do I want the source code for a game I have never heard of?
:p
Because you're tired of playing Tux Racer and the other two GPLed games?
The World's Worst Webcomic!
Does anyone else see the resemblance between the GNU icon used as a label on this story and a piece of poo? I know this is waaaaaay off topic (mod me down if you must) but it looks like a big whistling cartoon turd. Some long lost relative of Mr. Hankey's? Anyway, that is all.
I do a little bit of programming (for my own personal systems, mainly embedded) and I understand that for personal use the GPL and its lawyers will NOT prosecute me and chase me across the outback as I am one single person.
However, I would like to know (and I am asking on slashdot because I am confused not because I dont understand how to use google) how I can use GPL'ed code and libraries within my own work and NOT have to release my code.
Thanks in advance
I have code that I have put under the GPL and NONE of you can have it (because it shows how crap I am at C++). The reason I can do that is because under the GPL I would have to distribute this code to someone else for the re-distribution of code clauses to have any effect. Even then only those I have given the code to can ask for it from me, then the code is out of my hands and they have the freedom to re-distribute it with the same freedoms as given under the GPL
The GPL is not about stealing peoples code and making it public. It is about ensuring that the freedom you get from the code is passed onto those who you give the code to.
Besides you will rarely encounter GPL'ed libraries most are LGPL and that freedom thing does not apply to that. If you have any real further questions I suggest that you send an email to the FSF and ask them about it.
Even worse than that...
GPL is non-revokable.
You can dual-license a program you wrote from scratch. Legally it looks like this: you have 'root' version which is 'closeware' - "Nobody but me is allowed to use it, and I am allowed to change the license", and two 'branches' - GPL and the other license. Practically you don't but that's somewhat moot. You're allowed to develop the 'root' and upgrade the 'branches' according to your changes to 'root' but you're not allowed to backport users' changes to the GPL branch into the 'root' and Commercial branch.
You can't dual-license a program that has GPL components in itself. Your root is GPL and you can't relicense it. And even if the original author of the program you based your own on releases a second version under some license you need, your own 'root' is based on the GPL branch and is GPL. You can't change it. You may at best write a second version, a total rewrite from scratch, using the commercial version of the library as basis.
45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
The CEOs for all the create IT companies are in a room. A big room.
Suddenly someone screams "Hey, look at the news, it says here that PlayStation 2 Game ICO Violates the GPL!"
And then everyone laughs and cries out "who doesn't?"
It's already beyond common practice.
Onda Technology Institute
The problem lies in the possibility to identify all those parts.
If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker would destroy civilization.
You clearly have no idea what you're talking about. The GPL is indeed viral and does require the full release
of any source dependent or otherwise that is coupled with GPL code.
That said finding the definition of derivative and derivative works on the FSF's GPL FAQ page is quiet
interesting - they've gone to a lot of trouble hiding it towards the end, one would think such an
important FAQ would be say the 1st or 2nd listing.
Arash Partow's Philosophy: Be a person who knows what they don't know, and not a person who doesn't know.
Stallman wants you to believe that. Think about it for a minute. The GPL is about distribution. What if you dynamically link (or dlopen) your closed-source app to a GPL library? When you distribute the binary, you are not distributing GPL library code.
Do you even lift?
These aren't the 'roids you're looking for.
I have very limited needs that pertain to me; my issues concerning the GPL is not to do with not recognising someone elses work (I am more that happy to). My issue is that I want to keep my work, as a deriviate of their work (or more precisely, my code uses their code to do a specifc function and I use what it spits out ) entirely my own.
Am i better off just writing all of my own code from scratch?
And people wonder why there is opposition to the GPL? I remember recently someone saying that the GNU GPL is far less restrictive than corporate EULAs; I think examples like this show that it *can* be more restrictive in some cases. It doesn't *always* help the users (especially when the end users are people who don't give a flying ... anything about the source code).
I'm 15 and I know exactly what the difference between GPL and LGPL is (not word for word of course, but in general what can be done with them), if you need a lawyer to make sense of it then I'd advise you to just stay clear of it altogether
The libarc project page says that the library is licensed under the BSD license.
What "GPL" violation are these guys talking about?
http://sourceforge.net/projects/libarc/
Aside from that, non-free software libraries also have legal issues, and if you wanted to be safe, you would have to hire a lawyer in every case, because you have to deal with redistribution issues, plus in some cases EULAs.
In the case of the GPL you could hire a lawyer once (provided you don't understand the terms after actually reading them) and then reuse that knowledge forever. Also, there are lots of texts explaining the GPL available everywhere.
For other licenses, such as MIT or BSD, the Free Software Foundation can provide you with some pointers. The are biased toward the GPL, and they say so, but they provide all the information you actually need, and do a good job explaining the other licenses implications.
If you compare that situation with alternatives such as buying the distribution of non-free libraries, free software has fewer legal costs. Licenses have legal ramifications. Just because you pay the guy, it doesn't mean he will let you do whatever you want. And if you can't read a free software license alone, of course you will need a lawyer, but then you will need a lawyer to read your EULAs for you.
I know, I was just exaggerating for effect. This is /. you know.
But seriously, do we need so many licenses? They don't do themselves any favours.
I have excellent Karma and I am not afraid to Troll it.
At no point can they be forced to release the sourcecode. The legal system just doesnt work that way.
Assuming it is a GPL(not LGPL) library then yes, to legally distribute the game they have to release the source to all of it. But that doesnt mean that they have to retroactively comply to the license after they broke it, it just means that continuing to distribute it is illegal, and the software authors could sue for financial compensation.
Whether or not its easier to just release the sourcecode (which they may or may not even legally be able to do -- What if it contains restrictively licensed code that conflicts with the GPL?
Pain lasts, kid. Its how you know you're alive. Sometimes I think this growing up thing is just pain management-TheMaxx
Hey hey, Tux Racer, Battle for Wesnoth, Super Tux, Secret Maryo Chronicles and that game with the bouncing balls, that's at least FIVE GPL games right there, more than enough for any serious gamer, now stop spreading FUD because I set RMS on you.
If you use GPL works without adhering to the license, you *are* pirating. That's why the above poster said you could as well pirate any number of other apps.
GPL is not about attribution. GPL is about not being allowed to create derivative works and keep the source hidden. A library choses GPL because it does not want applications like your to exist.
Yes, you are better off writing this code from scratch.
This is the loophole that the new license GPL variant (whose name I forgot at the moment) is trying to close.
You mean the AGPL.
Is there any evidence that Sony didn't pay Izumo. If they did pay for a license then it won't be a GPL violation. There's noting to say, far as I know, that a software that's been GPL'ed can't be sold with another license by its author.
BTW, inflate.c itself seems to be not under GPL anyway. (Though mblock.c would be.)
To summarize, it was just a Zork/Myth-genre game for PS2, with the added continual challenge of having to drag around a retarded mute girl (seriously...she might as well have been a sack of flour).
First, it had a striking visual and aural style. Unlike many early PS2 games, it turned away from bright colours and fancy coloured lighting effects, adopting a colour scheme that verged on monochrome at times, with a heavy emphasis on contrasting light and dark areas. The music was distinctly minimalist, but fitted the game well enough that the soundtrack went on to sell well in its own right.
Nevertheless, it's an important part of gaming history. It was the first game to really use the power of its console generation to deliver something other than fancy special effects. It set new standards for story-telling, that remain influential even today.
Of course, it wasn't actually the first game of such a type even for Playstation. Legacy of Kain, which did have fighting, had a general focus on puzzles of the same variety, as well as a muted, artful style. And as mentioned, the artful style was a repeat of Myth, which was the result of the gradual progression from text adventures to graphical versions of the same kind of game. It might have been the first for PS2...
which was simultanously substantially flawed and deeply engaging.
This is essentially how I felt about ICO. Despite neat puzzles and a lack of focus on action, there was far too much focus on the controls. Once I solve the puzzle, it should be easy to put my solution into action. I shouldn't have to practice for a bit to get the controls to a point where I can implement my solution. That's what fighting games are for. So from the perspective of someone who has loved puzzle games like this, ICO seemed a sad remake of past glory.
It strikes me as a game that doesn't appeal to action gamers because of a lack of action (and puzzles that are too hard), and doesn't appeal to puzzle gamers because of too much action. It hits a "sweet spot" that appeals to virtually no one.
Mod me down and I will become more powerful than you can possibly imagine!
I cannot believe a company like sony did something stupid, that's _never_ happened before
If you intend to distribute your program to others, then yes, though you might want to investigate some other options first.
If there's particular GPL code you want to use, you could consider contacting the author directly (assuming you can establish a particular copyright holder) and explain what you want to do and see if they're willing to grant you use of their code under a different license. This can be a bit thorny: if they've accepted contributions from other people who haven't explicitly signed their copyright over to them, then the author does not have a legal right to re-license other people's work.
First though, I'd urge you to reconsider your aversion to the GPL. Chances are whatever you're doing isn't particularly unique and masterful, and you'll lose less than you'd think by making the code available.
Another "sneaky" tactic would be to consider who you're distributing the binaries to. You don't have to provide the source with them, only an offer (good for 3 years) to do so. So, if the people you're giving your small project to aren't likely to be interested in the source, you could take that gamble. You don't have to provide the source to anyone you didn't distribute your software to (but be aware that if you put it on a public web site, anybody can download it, and that's distribution). Just be prepared for the possibility that someone will ask for it, and be prepared to hand it over with a smile.
(IANAL, and this is not legal advice.)
I might be a singleton demographic but has anybody else here checked out the Webkins community web site for young children? My 7 year old nephew is an addict and was showing it to me recently. One of his favorite games on the site is an obvious knock off (web enabled) of Frozen Bubble, a game included with many Linux Distributions. There was no attribution I could see and I wondered if it was a potential violation of that game's license.
You only need to release the code to people who you give the executable to. i.e. yourself by the sound of it. Companies use custom modified GPL tools in-house all the time without releasing the code.
Its that simple. Release the source! that would be just fucking awesome.
There's no evidence this disassembly was being done for any other reason than to prove ownership/licence of the code used.
If the disassembly was being done to learn how it works then modify it so it bypasses copy protection etc then it would be a problem.
The link was
http://www.google.com/search?xQ=Sony+GPL&q=slashdot&btnI
Yeah, xQ is ignored, q is a search string and btnI is the same as clicking "I'm feeling lucky", i.e. go to the first hit.
echo -e 'global _start\n _start:\n mov eax, 2\n int 80h\n jmp _start' > a.asm; nasm a.asm -f elf; ld a.o -o a;
No, we don't need that many licenses. However, that isn't the Gnu project's fault. Stallman came up with a fairly simple, easy to understand, General Public License, applicable to pretty much any software one would want to copyleft. There were already simple, more permissive licenses around (and proliferation among those is not a problem). After that, all sorts of people and companies came up with all sorts of different licenses and variations, with all sorts of provisions. That changed the free software landscape from one where pretty much any free software could be combined, with the result either being under a generally permissive license or the GPL, to the license headache we have today.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
It's like the old public domain software, but infectious. I miss the idyllic old days when coders had minimal contact with lawyers. It seems against common sense, obviously they should release any changes they made to the library they utilised but to somehow claim their entire work as public domain for a minor addition, well that's legalese, and against the spirit of sharing. Still, it's all politics and licenses these days, the spirit has been caged and has lost its edge. Time for a new rebellion, global union hackers{int lose; int yoke;};
So they want us to pay them for copyrighted material and do not see a problem infringing other people's copyrighted material.
What is the inducement for them to infringe? Well, a commercial compression library license might have cost them $10k. They can't have it both ways. Either they pay for everything (and for companies "in" the circle, they'll probably get those fees down very low and "share" each other's copyrighted code) or they stop bitching about infringement on their own code.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
Not sure why you were modded troll.
If you don't distribute the code you modify, you can do what you like with it. The GPL says that if you modify something AND distribute it, you must provide the source with the finished product.
hope this helps.
At least a sack of flour doesn't $*@)$*( wander away
I may be wrong but isn't Warsow, Industri (Tenebrae2 Version), and Nexuiz all GPL games? I'm personally a Windows User but these three games are really good for being free with the source code. I'm not up to snuff on GPL, LGPL and all of that so I may be entirely wrong. But yes, I do remember years back messing with RedHat Linux 8 and was dissapointed that the only decent game that came with it was Tux Racer. Then again, I never bothered to pursue the world of free software. I don't hate Linux or anything like that, I'm just comfortable with Windows. I'd rather just install the game normally and have it straight up work. I don't want to try running it in WINE or a virtual machine, etc.
The company I work for has *ALL* licenses checked by lawyers. Open, closed, it doesn't matter. That cost is amortized across all purchased/obtained libraries.
It strikes me as a game that doesn't appeal to action gamers because of a lack of action (and puzzles that are too hard), and doesn't appeal to puzzle gamers because of too much action. It hits a "sweet spot" that appeals to virtually no one.
I found it perfect for me. I'm not a hardcore gamer, and I'm certainly not a fan of twitchy shooters (getting my ass handed to me in FEAR Combat for an hour or so a month does me fine). I loved the slow, deliberate pace of the puzzles in Ico. I didn't find any of them incredibly difficult, and I'm not sure what you meant about having to practice implementing your solution--when I figured out what needed to be done I pretty much went and did it (fighting off the smoke guys in a few places made this a little difficult). Ico was one of the first games I picked up for my PS2, and I still feel it was the best one I played on that system (I thought Shadow was so-so).
This guy's the limit!
Reading TFA, I couldn't help but notice that the source code does specify the GPL but then also says...
You can do whatever you like with this source file, though I would
prefer that if you modify it and redistribute it that you include
comments to that effect with your name and the date. Thank you.
Which seems to be saying the code is PD?
Clear, Dark Skies
According to the few info available in english on the page, this libarc is used to open quite a lot of different archive format (could some Japanese-speaking
Whereas, the sourceforge one, is mainly designed for a GZIPed ARC file used on the internet archive.
And whereas the libarc you point out is licensed under some sort of permissive license,
the Japanese libarc used by ICO is licensed under GPL. The file "inflate.c" is mentioned in TFA, and the following license/comments are cited
TFA's author then point out a couple of subtle difference all showing that it's this libarc's specific file which is used. (You can find similar "inflate.c" in a lot of decompression libraries. But libarc's has some specific memory subroutines, which can be traced in the disassembled code flow of the US version, or in the list of symbol names in the debug info included with the EU version).
:
/. has already been done. This game isn't produced anymore. /. er, only to the specific executable which contains the GPL code ("SCUS_971.13" according to TFA. The other few GB of data that are on the DVD are safe). /.ers (and which would require a little bit more work) would be to separate the functionality into a
---
Now to go back to the possible outcomes
- The most easy is to stop distributing the infringing piece of work.
Which as pointed out by the
- An alternative is to publish the code, *NOT* of the whole game, as said by some
- The third solution, which wasn't mentioned yet by
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
That game was so atmospheric it was actually scary - that was the main point of the combat, in fact - leave the girl alone to long and shadows attack her, which added a sense of urgency to the puzzle-solving. When I first got a few friends and I sat down to play it, and we would manage about 30mins of ICO before switching over to GTA to de-stress with some car chases and random murder. Then it was back to ICO for another 30mins :)
Star Control 2's code has been released under the GPL, and now continues to be developed as The Ur-Quan Masters. http://sc2.sourceforge.net/ Damn fun game!
You have this to obey this line:
So...you have to not restrict modification. You don't have to do anything special to make it easier. So you can't, for example, require a checksum based upon the combination of the LGPL'ed library and yours, because that would make it impossible to make modifications. You can require it to adhere to an ABI that's only in the specific version that you used, and doesn't work in future versions of the library. And nowhere does it say that you have to document how the thing is linked in or how to relink (that I saw).
So this is essentially a nonissue if you are writing the program for a modern computer. You kind of have to go out of your way to make it not link.
Mod me down and I will become more powerful than you can possibly imagine!
Watch for Sony to turn this whole thing around and sue the guy for disassembling the game.
Good thing this was Ico, and not Gran Turismo...
If they did not license a copy of libarc from the author, Sony committed copyright infringement and might be subject to statuatory damages of up to 150k per copy of the game sold. Can you register for copyright after an infringement occurs to sue for damages? Or maybe $1000, if we go by the Sony/RIAA 'pricing' for music sharing and minimum statuatory damages.
Sony can not retroactively satisfy the terms of the GPL. Releasing the source code (or a written offer for the source code) would only avoid compounding the infringement on future copies Sony distributes. Past copies they distributed were not conforming to the GPL, therefore unlicensed, therefore committing copyright infringement. They can't say 'oops' just because it took 6 years for their 'THEFT' to be noticed. This is no different than someone sued by the Sony/RIAA for music sharing. As it took so long for the infringement to be noticed, there's not much point in libarc's author going for an injunction to prevent future damages/infringement by stopping the sale of the game and/or destruction of unsold copies.
Now of course, the author of libarc might relent and compromise on your choices #1 or #2. Get a payoff and agree to forgo pursuing copyright infringement damages, or forgive it upon release of the source code.
I am not a lawyer, but this is how I think copyright and GPL applies to a hypothetical situation of Sony distributing a game containing an unlicensed copy of libarc. Any connection to the real world is accidental.
The proof seems pretty haphazard. I don't see where he proves that they're not simply using their own zlib-based function. They produce similiar output, right? What proof is that if libarc evokes zlib? Ico came out in 2001, so the chances of them using a really old version of zlib are quite high- development for the game could have started a couple years earlier, possibly with an early devkit, or even an original playstation development environment.
This could be a coincidence easily, considering the names are so standard and dry- they could easily be almost the same function or whomever wrote this blarg simply misinterpreted the assembly and found a coincidence connected to similiar functions.
At very worst, a japanese engineer thought it was an lgpl-based file, since it started with lib and just messed up. who's going to care?
Where's the beef? Am I missing something?
If your software is complicit in using MySQL as backend for your propietary product (you could have always actively rejected the use of it to avoid this situation), YOU HAVE TO PONY UP FOR A COMMERCIAL LICENSE
Thems the breaks. Same goes for QT, and a bunch of other stuff.
THIS THING CAN TURN ON A DIME, MACROSSZERO STYLE ALSO FUCK BETA, ~NYORON
But it isn't and never will be entirely your own. As long as it contains someone else's code it will be yours AND theirs. So they have a say in what is done with their code. If you don't like the terms, find code with a different license.
http://www.popularculturegaming.com -- my blog about the culture of videogame players
Wow. There's a little superiority complex thing happening there. I didn't realize I was apparently less ethical than you for using proprietary software. Now I do, and I shall apply the appropriate feelings of being chastened.
Or not.
If ICO violates the GPL, Sony not only has to give the source, they have to give ways to recompile it and to execute it on a PS2 ; i.e., to give a way to compile and execute any program on an unmoded PS2 machine. This has more implications than just giving a source code...
I personally made that image, drawing it pixel by pixel. Thus the copyright belongs solely to me, and Alexander Strange has an full license to use the image as he sees fit.
A copyright restricts distribution to the copyright holder.
The GPL is a license that gives permission for others to redistribute GPL'd code under its terms. The only relation to copyright is that if you violate the terms of the agreement (GPL isn't a contract) then you may be infringing on the copyright. If you don't copy, redistribute, or otherwise do something that could infringe on a copyrighted work, a GPL notice in some source file means jack squat.
That definition fails for dynamically linked executables. They don't have the library code compiled into their executable. Instead, they run the library code from a copy already installed on the computer.
This is why the GPL specifically uses phrases like "works based on it" which prevents you from weaseling out of it through dynamic linking.
GLaDOS for President 2016! "Well here we are again. It's always such a pleasure." -- GLaDOS, 2011
In my opinion, Ico is the single best game for the PS2 and in the running for the best games of all time. Although never a great commercial success for Sony, it has a strong following. I just bought a copy (used, Sony is no longer selling it) to give as a gift. I was surprised how much I had to pay for it. With many other PS2 games of similar vintage going for $10 or so, used copies of Ico are selling just a bit below new game prices, and new copies are selling for more than new PS3 games.
Technically a puzzle/platform game, I think that it achieves the perfect combination of story, art, drama, technical execution, and intellectual and skill challenge.
Eh? The zlib license definitely doesn't read like public domain, more like the modified BSD license.
I'm going to stray from the more serious GPL talks and just throw in my initial reaction. I'm not sure how games are programmed but if the source is released wouldn't it be pretty awesome to see ICO mods surface. I was a pretty big fan of the game (and Shadow of the Colossus) and a mod of the game could be really fun!
my site of misleading and incorrect information!
If it was my GPLd code you were using and you'd be some little guy I'd ask for compliance. If you were a big guy I'd sue you into next wednesday for as much I could press out of it. I'd see no point in being as polite as Richard Stallman and just asking for compliance if you'd be caught proactively breaking the GPL.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
libarc borrows heavily from zlib, which is .. surprise ! .. BSD licensed. There is however no mention of BSD in libarc, which effectively means that it is in violation of BSD license.
Gotta love the ethics of the freedom fighters.
3.243F6A8885A308D313
> What's this "viral GPL myth"? I thought the GPL was viral (and proud of it). Is there some
> confusion out there?
"GPL is viral" is an analogy. As any analogy, it is neither wrong nor right, but work on some level, and break down if taken too far.
The GPL provides programmers with an incitement to put their own code under the GPL, by rewarding the programmer with access to the existing body of GPL'ed code. In that sense you can say that it propagates like life in general, and viruses in particular. However, unlike life, it does not self-propagate. It propagates when the programmer decides that the reward (access to GPL'ed code) is greater than the cost (has to release his own code under a GPL compatible license).
The "myth" would be where the analogy breaks down, e.g. when people mistakenly believe they can "accidentally" make their code GPL'ed, like you can accidentally be infected with a biological or computer virus.
The analogy also has strong negative connotations, and it was specifically invented for those connotation (I was there). This is why viruses, associated with diseases, was chosen, rather than a more positive expression of life.
I have noticed that lately some people who aren't enemies of the GPL have begun using the analogy. I suggest they stop doing that, it brings more darkness than light, and the negative connotations from both biology and computer programs are too strong to overcome.
Funny because ICO is one of my favourite games ever. I found it kept the old puzzle game style (Easy puzzles with non-obvious solutions that you can do in a heart beat one you realise them) and a HUGE world to explore, where everything is polished and impressive.
ICO's "greatness" comes in that it just tries to be ICO, it's not some uber deep beat em up and it's not some impossible to finish puzzle game. It's just a sleepy little world where you explore and make your way out of the castle at your own pace. Some puzzles are damn hard, some puzzles are damn easy, but the point is that if you wanted you could easily just run around a room admiring the world as easy as you could play it like a speed run.
Maybe it doesn't appeal to the mainstream, but most my friends consider ICO to be a classic because it feels and plays like nothing else. The "vibe" the game gives off is easily one of the deepest and most impressive of all the games I've played in my 15 years of gaming.
I like muppets.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_open_source_games
Oblig. Penny Arcade Link: http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2001/09/28
In 3010, the potatoes triumphed
zlib is zlib licensed
Even if ICO's source code was released under th GPL (which isn't gonna happen), then we'd still be missing the media content.
Unless you want to supply your own textures, models, sound effects, and music, then I recommend you stick to Tux Racer as a playable game.
It would only benefit developers at first, but everyone here knows that already.
EULA: Attempting to enforce further stipulations upon your use of the product after the time of purchase, adding restrictions in addition to standard legal protections without granting any additional benefit to the purchaser.
GPL: No further stipulations added beyond standard "sale" of item. However, it will reduce restrictions on standard legal protections as long as you agree to certain limitations.
EULAs unilaterally add restrictions after the fact, and are not enforced by law if you don't agree to them. The GPL grants you rights in addition to what you are allowed under the law, but you are not required to accept these additional rights. These are two completely different situations, and supporting one without supporting the other is not hypocritical in any way.
The source code for ICO isn't all that useful unless you also get all the data for the game too.
Without that, Sony is just releasing the code for a uselessly obsolete game engine. Is that really a big deal?
> 3. This notice may not be removed or altered from any source distribution.
and libarc removed it
3.243F6A8885A308D313
Because the GPL says so. Do you think the FSF/GNU "collective" should be as evil as the big corporations?
Okay, two questions. First, where in the GPL does it say that you have to release the source? Second, EVEN IF IT DID say you had to release the source, which it categorically DOES NOT, explain what legal fact would make it true that they'd need to provide the supporting compilers, etc?
http://xkcd.com/16/
*sigh*
You all have Oo.o and Firefox, so get World Wind.
I doubt you'll find any jurisdiction where drawing a simple symbol is considered a derivative work of any kind.
You don't mean "commercial" because GPL-covered code is distributed for a fee and is thus already commercial code. You mean proprietary code.
Digital Citizen
Let's say I write a closed source linux app. The GNU readline library provides nice user input editing, but is GPL licensed. There are also FREE (as in virus-free) MIT/BSD licensed alternatives (such as tecla or libedit). I, the enterprising programming, can use dlopen/dlsym to runtime-link whichever one is already installed (using my own version if none are available). Does it violate the (spirit of) the GPL if the user has gnu readline installed? Does it violate the (spirit of) the GPL if the user doesn't have gnu readline installed? The distributable binary doesn't contain *any* GPL code. Stallman's position on dynamic linking is out of touch.
Do you even lift?
These aren't the 'roids you're looking for.
I didn't play Ico until after I'd played Sands of Time, and at face value it seems like essentially a precursor to Sands of Time with graphics that aren't quite as nice. It has more depth to it, though much of it is left unexplained -- I wanted to know more about the backstory, like why that castle was there and how the tradition of sacrificing horned children there came about.
Another poster commented on the use of light and shadow in Ico, and that's something I found very interesting as well. It's not just the artwork, but the environment and the characters too: the Queen and her minions are shadowy and evil, but the gates of the castle are operated by giant beams of sunlight, and Yorda practically glows. I feel like there must be there some significance to that, but it's left a mystery by the game; I have to settle for my own speculation.
BTW, Yorda isn't mute: she does speak a few times during the game. She just doesn't talk much because she and Ico don't understand each other's language. (The Japanese version has an option to make her words understandable on the second play-through, but that feature didn't make it into the US and European releases. You can find her translated dialogue on the web though.)
To be able to install the executable, you have to be able to put it on a CD, you have to be able to run this CD, so you don't need a modchip.
Reatraction of the Slashdot Orange Box story, which has been proven by other reviewers to be totally blown out of all proportion by the original articile at 1UP, and the BS spread around by gutter sites like Slashdot.
That only speaks about doing it that way from the beginning - i.e., doing things properly from the beginning. It says nothing about releasing the code retroactively as a way of undoing past infringement - and as such, normal laws apply - meaning the past is the past, and if you infringed in the past, ceasing to infringe in the present and on into the future (by releasing the code) does not in any way change the fact that you are still liable for the previous violation - it still happened. Secondly, the second paragraph you quote doesn't require they distribute the compiler. In fact, it specifically excludes the all componentes of the compiler in the latter half of the paragraph.
In previous cases of violations of the GPL, FSF agreed to "forget" about the violation when the violator released the source code. For the second paragraph, I never talked of the fourniture of the compiler, only of a way to execute the resulting compiled program on the unmoded hardware.
But seriously, do we need so many licenses? They don't do themselves any favours. We don't. But the GPL is the one most widespread license, and it actually has a lot of real and tangible effects. The GPL is one of the tools that make possible the current availability and usage of free software. The fact that it encourages sharing is important.
So no, we don't need that many licenses, let's keep just the most important and popular, I'm OK with that.
but aren't the libraries licensed under LGPL which gives you permission to compile binaries and distribute them so long as you don't change the libs. If you change the libraries you need to release back to the wild under the GPL. If my understanding is wrong then there are thousands of companies that have violated the GPL. Anyone that uses GCC and distributes the results is in violation. Tell me I'm wrong.
SG