Slashdot Mirror
Did Microsoft Borrow GPL Code For a Windows 7 Utility?
Goatbert writes "Rafael Rivera over at WithinWindows.com has found evidence that Microsoft has potentially stolen code from an open source/GPL'd project (ImageMaster) for a utility made available on the Microsoft Store to allow download customers to copy the Windows 7 setup files to a DVD or USB Flash Drive. If Rivera's evidence holds up, this could be some serious egg in the face for Microsoft at a time when they're getting mostly good press from the tech media."
The code in question seems to be called into scrutiny because the two areas of code bear the same name (ReadBytes) and operate similarly.
The longer you work in the development of software, the less magical it all becomes. The first time you plugged some code into a terminal and it worked, it seemed like an amazing amount of wizardry and behind-the-scenes stuff that you could never fully fathom. Compilers, binary code, arcane source languages, electronic signals. It's amazing to a neophyte just how much stuff is going on.
But the longer you plug away at it, the more you realize that it's just code. Nothing special is really going on. You're mostly moving data from one area of memory to another. It's almost a form of Nirvana once you reach this point.
So when someone comes along and says "OMG YOUR READBYTES METHOD IS JUST LIKE THIS ONE IN SOME GPL CODE!!!!11", it kind of pegs that person as someone who doesn't really have much experience with real programming. Sure, they may use a lot of tools, and know how to recompile their kernel, but they really don't have a firm grasp of what and why they are doing what they are doing.
So the evidence is a ReadBytes snippet?
I'll wait till there's evidence before even commenting about the ramifications of something like this. This is just wild speculation at this point.
) Human Kind Vs Human Creation
) It'd be interesting to see how many humans would survive to serve us.
really? they "stole" readbytes? can we have some different "damning evidence" please.
Stop being insecure about Windows' successes. It's fucking embarassing. Linux has it's place, and that place is nowhere near the average consumer's home computer.
Microsoft has had open source code earlier also. But it's been licenced with bsd kind of licence. The problem is that if there are gpl-licenced code taken (doesn't need permission of project owners) microsoft has to give all changes they made to public. Gpl can also touch so depends what they've done with/to that they might also need to distribute more code of theirs. There is also organisation who's trying to track down and sue corporations violating OS licences (can't remember name), maybe they get some job to do.
I can't stand about Microsoft? Even though we don't have the source and can't prove it, Windows likely uses GPL code.
The GPL requires any company using GPL software to release their additions to the source. Everybody storm Redmond! Get it! Get the code!
It's .NET code. It's already "Open Source" by virtue of tools like Reflector existing.
in the worst case, they could publish the full source of the application in order to comply with the gpl... I mean, it is just a tool to copy files from a to b, right? so it is kind of a silly article.
If Pandora's box is destined to be opened, *I* want to be the one to open it.
Yep - it's not like they have never done anything like that before (Stacker).
They never lie, cheat, or steal. Never, ever, ever.
Microsoft is evil. Always has been. Always will be.
People who use Microsoft software are so locked into it that they have to accept whatever Microsoft managers decide to do, no matter how abusive. Microsoft has been abusive for years, and the lock-in continues. Many publications depend on Microsoft advertising; they don't write negative articles about Microsoft.
Dollar to a donut - Microsoft DID NOT BORROW any GPL code.
Borrowing implies some intent to properly compensate, reward, or return something.
Microsoft STOLE GPL code.
How many developers took code they wrote for their company and used it in a GPL project afterwards?
Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong fix.
Come on people, you can't have it both ways. If you can't "steal" music, you can't "steal" code. MS "stealing" this code didn't deprive the Open Source community from using the code (i.e. stealing my car), or at least that's the argument /.er use whenever the word is used in conjunction with music and movies. Eat your own dog food.
Microsoft is evil. Always has been. Always will be.
Maybe you're very young, but I seem to recall that Microsoft was at one time held as a sort of liberator from IBM's hegemony. I guess it's all a matter of perspective...
I, for one, welcome our newest open source project to the community - Windows 7.
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
That was a very short period of time. As soon as Microsoft had established itself - even before Windows - they started their campaigns against any competitors.
Goatbert engages in anal stretching. My evidence: the names are very similar.
Wait, you mean similarities DON'T mean that they are the same thing? Damn. I thought I was on to something.
But then I realized the cable was blue, so I only gave it one star. I hate blue.
By whom?
My memory of the early days of Microsoft was surprise that their nasty behaviour was tolerated.
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
Copyright infringement is not stealing. No mater who does it.
Seriously, what he shows to be evidence looks like code that was written straight from reading the ISO disk image specification. Next up, school math class accused of mass cheating for solving math problems in similar ways.
Fly me to the moon Let me sing among those stars Let me see what spring is like On jupiter and mars
I've written subroutines called "ReadByte" several times, so obviously both the Microsoft code and the GPL code is in violation of my company's copyright! (BTW, if the ReadBytes routine doesn't have a buffer size parameter and return the actual number of bytes read, it is bad code.)
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
Ok, then... If MS used GPL code, then they did not "Borrow" it either
They used it in violation of copyright
No sig for the moment.
I still see them that way. Have you ever *used* Lotus Notes? Can you imagine what work would be like if that was the only groupware option out there? Ugh.
Comment of the year
Even if true, surely Microsoft would just need to perform minor corrective action (replace the code promptly and discipline or fire those responsible for inserting the stolen code). The software isn't a significant part of the system. Nor does it seem to be a difficult bit of code. So you can't really claim that Microsoft is making boatloads off of or even just saving money by stealing the code. And I think MS probably could make a good argument for saying that either they had a rogue developer or someone made a terrible mistake in inserting the code. It just doesn't look like "egg on face" to me unless the replacement of the code results in some high publicity drama like a recall of the OS.
Probably those who get paid to work on GPL software...
Your point is? Do you have an accusation to make?
No sig for the moment.
With the amount of "evidence" in the article, the same accusation could be made against the GPL project. Perhaps the author of that project illegally gained access to Microsoft code and used it as a starting point for ImageMaster.
Ever think that if this code was stolen it was done by a lower level employee and not an executive. It is way more likely that a small group of employees couldn't hit a deadline or something and so they borrowed code form other places to get it done. I know executives and have heard many executives speak... they don't like legal exposure, they don't want to do things wrong because it is their neck on the line. It is way more likely that it was the average slashdot user who did this than it was a "Microsoft Corporation" decision.
I also don't know the validity of these claims but I read some posts saying that this stuff was outsourced. aka Microsoft didn't even claim to code it, they just bought botched code. Good going with your theory... it appears even more that the "evil" people in this situation are lowlife developers and not the "Corporate Suits" that your agenda is pushing.
Microsoft as a corporation is the victim here TBH.
Considering the existence of laws such as the "The Artists' Rights and Theft Prevention Act of 2005", the "The Digital Theft Deterrence and Copyright Damages Improvement Act of 1999", and various others, it seems clear that the US Congress disagrees with you.
Microsoft is evil. Always has been. Always will be.
Maybe you're very young, but I seem to recall that Microsoft was at one time held as a sort of liberator from IBM's hegemony. I guess it's all a matter of perspective...
Bill Gates' open letter to hobbyists. Any questions?
Luckily IBM never lowered themselves to such despicable practices.
How many developers took code they wrote for their company and used it in a GPL project afterwards?
How many people speed without getting a ticket? How many people take a stapler from their employer and don't get fired? You imply that it's only wrong if everyone gets punished for it.
Besides, your example is flawed beyond that: There are cases where taking code from your company is perfectly legal and fine, like... If your employer decides to make the code produced open source. I understand that's not normally the case, but it's worth mentioning.
>> Microsoft is evil. Always has been. Always will be.
> Maybe you're very young, but I seem to recall that Microsoft was at one time held as a sort of liberator from IBM's hegemony. I guess it's all a matter of perspective...
Maybe YOU are very young. IBM was taking a beating and didn't manage to get their own PC done.
So they assembled a task force and said go and get us an IBM PC.
They did it -- without IBM parts!
The processor was from Intel and the OS from a small company who had to buy it from someone else, because they couldn't do it in time (little did we know then what these guys were up to).
In summary, there were a lot of good computers with other OSes, the main ones being CP/M and AppleDOS (not necessarily the better ones).
So:
1) M$ actually helped IBM (for money, of course) and
2) M$ is known to innovate after others innovated first.
I could cite sources, but this way we can argue longer. 8-)
Not that anyone reads ACs here anymore...
I don't think everyone here believes you can't steal music, first off.
Speak for yourself. I do believe you can't steal music.
You could steal the original copies. You could steal a famous painting. But "stealing" music? For instance, what IS music? It's nothing but a mathematical concept involving harmonics and sound.
What are words? You can't "steal" what I said. This isn't like the little mermaid where you could steal someone's voice and leave him/her mute.
Non-physical works CANNOT be stolen. Unless you're talking about a PHYSICAL COPY, you cannot steal it by definition. Copying a work? That's completely different. But if it's a non-destructive process, you're not stealing it. You're just COPYING it.
If you want to use an appropriate term for what Microsoft supposedly did with this GPL code, it's called plagiarism. Sure, it's called "stealing" nowadays, but using this word is oversimplifying.
How corporations always come up with excuses like "it was a low-level employee" or "an oversight" or "a honest mistake" to cover their corporate culture of evilness?
There's someone that has to vet the code. A few snippets could leak thru. I'd find it flattery by plaigarism.
Then I'd laugh at how a jr coder might do such a thing. After all, no one ever steals code, ever. That would be wrong.
---- Teach Peace. It's Cheaper Than War.
Did Microsoft Borrow...
Microsoft borrows, everyone else steals?
I wonder if I can try that with the RIAA/BSA?
I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
Copyright infringement is not stealing. No mater who does it.
Copyright infringement IS stealing - it just has a different legal definition. It literally fits the non-legal definition. Stealing stocks is a called fraud or embezzlement. Stealing property from a home is called burglary. Stealing cars is called grand theft auto. Stealing copyrighted works is called copyright infringement. Stealing is stealing. Period.
Please stop purposely trying to mislead people by attempting to craft mind share. You're purposely attempting to confuse the morale and plain English definition and implications with that of the legal definition. The fact is, stealing is stealing. If you take something to which you have no right to do so, you are a thief - regardless of its exact legal classification.
Pirates need to come to terms with the fact they are thieves - no better than the scum they likely condemn.
You may not ... reverse engineer, decompile or disassemble the software, except and only to the extent that applicable law expressly permits, despite this limitation;
Which seems to be exactly what the Author has done. Sucks to be him, or anyone else trying to find out if M$ has stolen your code and violated your license, since the only way to find out, is to violate M$'s license agreement. Have fun in court.
So based on a fragment of pretty basic code doing a very basic task that most people would write off the top of their head the assumption that it has been stolen from OSS.
This is like the old SCO claim around the Knuth code. There really are some basic bits that date back to the pre-history of IT. This is a long way from evidence and doesn't make the OSS world look any better than SCO did with their claims.
Evidence folks needs to be a bit bigger than a method.
An Eye for an Eye will make the whole world blind - Gandhi
None, unless the employer has specifically agreed. If you believe otherwise, then prove it.
FTA: A simple search of some method names and properties, gleaned from Reflector's output, revealed the source code was obviously lifted from the CodePlex-hosted (yikes) GPLv2-licensed ImageMaster project.
Give me a break! That's just enough evidence to go and dig more deeply. It's hardly proof of anything, but the author's bias.
Yes, after reading the original letter I have one: how does that letter prove that Microsoft is evil? The only thing Gates is saying is that he and his company has invested around $40000 in building and supporting the software, and the return was so small, it was just enough to break even. The pay, he states, was $2 an hour. If you don't mind working for $2 an hour, that's ok of course, but most people probably wouldn't go to the university to learn computer science if their pay was less than that of a mcdonalds employee.
Apple has "Mac vs PC", Microsoft has "Laptop Hunters", Linux has recession
No, they did not. Borrow is the completely wrong word here. Maybe they stole the code, but they certainly didn't borrow it.
It hardly matters though. It is perfectly OK when Microsoft does this, as seen from a long lime of past actions. When you copy their code it is a felony, but when they take something that they want it's just business as usual.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
Stealing is stealing. Period.
Yes, and copyright infringement ain't it, no matter how much your employer wishes otherwise.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
This is Microsoft. The company that tries to step on as many other companies as possible. Do you honestly think that Microsoft doesn't look at GPL'd code and add it? Hahhaah I wouldn't be surprised if a good 50%+ was GPL'd. It'd be a great day of defeat for Microsucks if this got confirmed. Considering their piece of crap Windows 7 it'd only be the final nail in the coffin. :)
No, there is one major difference. If I steal your car, you can't use it any more. If I copy your software, you can still use it. I don't take something away. In most cases, the copyright holder doesn't even notice.
It's the copyright holders that are trying to mislead people and contort the English language by saying stealing is the same as copying.
I don't think slashdot is correct place to handle issues like this.
"If Rivera's evidence holds up, this could be some serious egg in the face for Microsoft at a time when they're buying mostly good press from the tech media".
Knowing how things happen in media today - hint: in economical downturn even serious press are easy to buy - this is only a half joke.
user@ubuntubox:~$ stfu This server is going down for shutdown NOW!
Well, they do get -some- bad press occasionally but in general the mainstream media faun over MSFT constantly. The freakin BBC aired an interview with Ballmer recently where they asked him all sorts of questions about the world economy! WTF? Does Ballmer have a degree in economics? Does he have a crystal ball? And if he did know something we don't about the economy, would he really share it freely? Really?
Damping absorbs vibrations. Dampening is caused by moisture.
Not really. If you buy a stolen car and then get cough, you get to lose your car. MS will not make me cry.
The half ass coders are in Windows land. Obviously the better coders jump to OSS
the US Congress is free to be as wrong as it wants to be.
The differences you fail to make clear is that copyright infringement isn't stealing something physical as in all your cases. Copyright infringement is making a copy without the permission of the copyright holder. It isn't like you denied the copyright holder any of their possessions as NO ONE can guarantee that the infringer would have bought the work to begin with. This is well a established precept.
You can lead a man with reason but you can't make him think.
We have a society where a huge proportion of people violate copyright and feel okay doing it. Why would anybody give a crap when Microsoft does a little of the same? People will start taking the GPL seriously when they start taking copyright in general seriously. That is, never.
Element109 wrote on: http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/windowsopticalplatform/thread/421f3137-c9aa-45fb-8c5a-ec5dd6860036
The iso and udf parsing portions were ported from the 7-zip project. The credits.txt file contains all the sources used in creating my project.
7z
by Igor Pavlov
7-Zip is a file archiver with a high compression ratio.
http://www.7-zip.org
There are links to his source on his homepage. 7-zip is hosted on the SourceForge website.
If you checkout my initial upload there is a file in the reader directory that is a very early stage of the initial udf port. I had excluded it from the VS environment and forgot about it. It is the file I deleted in the latest changeset.
Why? I don't get it. Sure, Windows 7 is about 100x better than Vista, but it's still buggy, unstable, a late copy cat of other superior OSes that have been out for a while (Mac/Ubuntu), and worst of all: Horribly prone to viruses.
In the last two months I've done 20 reformats and OS installs. Of the 20, 10 were Windows 7 installs, and 7 were Linux Mint installs, and the other 3 were stock Ubuntu. Of the 7 Mint installs, I have gotten NO tech support calls. Not one. Every customer is happy and going about their business happily watching YouTube, making docs in Open Office, and IMing in Pidgin. Literally, not ONE tech support call. I got one tech support call for Ubuntu, the client didn't know how to install flash. I should've done that before I "finished" the job. Kind of my fault.
No less than 5 of the Windows 7 installs have had to be REDONE. 5 of the clients got viruses within the first week, and needed a reformat. I switched 3 of them to Ubuntu 9.10. The other 2 I gave extremely stern lectures about Firefox, and bookmarked redtube on the bookmarks toolbar.
I don't understand why everyone is all over MS in a good way for Windows 7. It is still under-featured, bloated, prone to viruses, slow to boot, and lacking in stability compared to almost every Linux distro out these days. The ONLY reason I install Windows is for gamers. And even for some of them I setup dual boot with Ubuntu or Mint and try to make them boot to Linux for everything BUT gaming.
I hold very few opinions. I hold information based on observation and fact. If you wish to disagree, please use facts.
Copyright infringement isn't theft, as the pirates always tells us on Slashdot, so nothing was "stolen."
And who would have given the people the impossible deadline to meet?
If you're in charge, you're responsible. You can't claim to be both in charge of something and also not responsible for it...
It doesn't matter who codes it, it matters who distributes it. That's what the license is about: distributing the code (as opposed to using the code, which is allowed with no restriction by the license as long as you don't distribute), in binary, and for GPL also in source form...
MS the victim here... LOL ROTFL
Luckily IBM never lowered themselves to such despicable practices.
This isn't about IBM. We're over them. Microsoft is still an overwhelming force in the industry.
They abused their monopoly by forcing OEMs to give them unfair advantages over competition. This isn't just an opinion... the only real competitor (Apple) has complete control over their hardware systems, and that's why they can compete.
All my liberal friends think I'm a conservative, all my conservative friends think I'm a liberal.
In the case of the Executive that didn't properly get the code vetted that's the company's responsibility. You would let them claim executive incompetence over responsibility? They could get away with anything! That product should be pulled and/or should be open sourced and the code released as is required.
In the case of the "individual" that released the code that they wrote to GPL, they are either in violation of the GPL, or they had the right to do it. This isn't open source's community's responsibility. The larger company making a profit off the work of others and being in violation of the GPL have a greater obligation and responsibility than the open source community where a programmer may have contributed all or part of a project.
And, it isn't common to hear that the open source community is using closed source proprietary code illegally. The open source community prides itself on removal of that offending code, period! It is not uncommon to hear that a large corporation is in violation of the GPL.
You can lead a man with reason but you can't make him think.
I used to think Lotus Notes was painful, bloated and clumsy. Then the business unit I was in was sold to a Microsoft Exchange company. After the ease of Lotus, the support for on/off/unknown network states realize how ungrateful I was. I miss the Lotus and easy synchronization.
That's crap. You do too take something away - you take away the renumeration you should have paid.
I had an agreement with one of my employers that (because I didn't like writing code where they would make profit off my blood & sweat when I did all the work and not being hired as a programmer) all code I wrote was mine to freely do with as I wished.
You can lead a man with reason but you can't make him think.
Now everyone can have a great time bashing Microsoft again like they have for the last 15 years.
Grow up people... even IF they're guilty it's a tiny piece of code probably stolen by a single employee without anyones knowledge or consent.
Sorry, I'm just so-effing-tired of people bitching and whining about the smallest of things.
Copyright infringement is not stealing. No mater who does it.
Nononono, we'll hear none of that here. If it's open source software, it is stealing, as well as genocide.
I know what dealing with Outlook is like, if that's any kind of an answer.
Microsoft shifted to being a tool for weasel middle-manager types ages ago.
7-Zip is LGPL. They still have to release all their source mods, but they don't have to open whatever they link with.
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
Mmmmm RIAA Kool-Aid, tasty.
The difference being, when IBM was threatened with anti-trust action, they tried to please thr justice department, but when Microsoft was threatened prosecution, they defied the justice department all the way, until a "business friendly" administration dropped the ball.
The Stacker case was related to software patents not the outright coping of source code.
Copyright infringement IS stealing
No, it isn't. Here is a handy guide illustrating the difference.
it just has a different legal definition.
And you know *why* that is? Because *IT'S NOT THE SAME*. If copyright infringement *WAS* the same as theft, we wouldn't need a special law dealing with it - it could be covered by theft laws. The fact that it isn't should tell you something.
It literally fits the non-legal definition.
No, it doesn't. It fits the propaganda term. Just because some media trade groups misapply a term as an act of propaganda does not make it so.
Why is it that the only copyright violations that upset the /. masses are those involving code under the GPL?
Microsoft is evil. Always has been. Always will be.
Maybe you're very young, but I seem to recall that Microsoft was at one time held as a sort of liberator from IBM's hegemony. I guess it's all a matter of perspective...
Your enemies enemy is not your friend.
Microsoft are and have always been a very bad thing for computing and everything that relies on computing. If they never existed we would likely be living in a far better world right now.
You are believing "facts" quoted by Gates that you can't check. (I'll believe that he hired people for $2 / hr. I won't believe that that was *his* recompense...though he *might* have been living on his family.)
Still, his "open letter" wasn't as bad as his business practices at the same time...though that got a lot less publicity.
Companies that trusted MS tended to go out of business even then. MS was still small, though, so many of them just had trade secrets stolen, and their going out of business was delayed until MS became a more significant competitor. Also: Gates didn't invent dumpster diving, but he practiced it.
Still, there was a period when I though MS would be a less abusive company to deal with than IBM. And for around five-seven years it was true. This was probably because IBM wasn't allowed to compete by a consent decree, so IBM basically ignored the personal computer.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
Of course they did, they're a company... All companies try to beat out the competition.
So it's Okay for MS to use open source code but any open source project that uses MS code can be hounded and threatened? Let's see, is it 238 patents MS complains open source uses of MS's?
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
Its not that we hate copyrights except for ones for GPL We just think that its wrong for microsoft to sell a product, which steals functionality from a free one.
You are entitled to your own opinions, not your own facts.
We aren't "over IBM". They are still one of the dominant forces in the industry. But IBM *did* actually reform. It took them decades, but they did. So far MS has shown no indication of even wanting to (outside of PR moves).
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
doesn't anyone know about...
c:\windows\system32\drivers\etc\hosts
?
microsoft is famous for stealing code.
It's that time again. Before anyone comments on GPL lifting, please take the GPL quiz:
The GPL Quiz
Anyone who gets a perfect score may comment in this thread, all others please keep uninformed conclusions out.
The Right Reverend K. Reid Wightman,
That is not what I said. What I said is "Microsoft" probably didn't know about, authorize or condone the use of (GPL)open source code. That does not mean it is OK that it did happen. It does mean people need to stop generalizing from incidents like this to the idea that the Microsoft corporation is evil when it is individual actors at a low level that make this happen. Of course it is hard for everyone HERE to admit because that would imply, you guessed it, developers are the ones that actually are to blame. I find this ironic because of anyplace you would think Slashdot would be the place that would understand that higher ups never look at the code and only care that it works. So please re-read what I said in my OP and try and understand it, obviously you didn't understand it the first time because I never said MS has the right to use the code.
I used to think Lotus Notes was painful, bloated and clumsy.
And you don't now?
After the ease of Lotus, the support for on/off/unknown network states realize how ungrateful I was.
Maybe your company should have just fixed the network. Of course, Outlook works just fine in offline mode too, so really I have absolutely no idea what your trying to suggest here.
The *ease* of Lotus? Notes is the antithesis of "ease."
I miss the Lotus and easy synchronization.
You miss "the Lotus." Are you still in 3rd grade, by chance?
And yeah, easy synchronization. Like how you have to buy additional software to get Notes to synchronize to... well, basically *any device at all*. And how it'll then corrupt that device's database by various means-- my favorite was when it tried to enter meetings that ended before they began into a Palm. (Admittedly, the Palm should have rejected the meeting instead of corrupting itself, but still-- how the holy hell does Notes even *allow* meetings to end before they begin?)
Then the business unit I was in was sold to a Microsoft Exchange company.
I may have the opposite problem. My company's been sold to a company that, I understand, uses Notes. If they try to force me onto Notes, I'm quitting. And yes, I *do* feel that strongly about it.
Comment of the year
I think most people think Outlook is pretty bad, until they actually have to *use* Notes... believe me, if you believe Outlook sets a low bar, Notes' bar is underground.
I'm certainly not going to suggest Outlook is perfect, or even good. But compared to the alternative, it's incredible.
Comment of the year
Next someone will be accusing them of licensing other companies' code and then secretly incorporating it as part of their OS!! Geez, or someone will accuse them of sueing to death the original legal owner of the name, Internet Explorer. Geez, next someone will accuse their foundation of having far more investments in companies supporting bloody and violent African mercenary armies compared to what little good their foundation does in comparison to the actual harm.
Look, when you take to functions that do essentially the same thing, and you compile them, to optimized code, there is a good chance, if the compiler is doing its job that the compiled byte code looks a lot a like. This code HAS to act the same, its reading the same data format. Its no surprised that when you decompile different versions that they look the a like, I would be concerned if they didn't.
Go ahead and decompile it, so you aren't seeing the original source, you're seeing a decompilers version of the optimized code.
I could probably write that function 100 different ways in one day and get the exact same thing out after compiling it to optimized byte code and then decompiling it. Its a rather specific process at that point for dealing with a standard. You almost HAVE to do things in that function that way in order for your code to actually work. There are a few changes that could be made, some branches could be done in different orders, but once you throw the optimizer at it, those branches are likely going to be reordered the same way to reuse registers and such rather than wasting extra ones.
The author of the article is a newbie at best. Its fairly clear that he doesnt' actually understand what has happened in this process and has provided no evidence other than 'the end result looks the same!'. It could have went both ways, neither project was the first to write a UDF reader. My guess would be the first C# UDF code was actually a port of some C code to do it anyway.
Finally if you read the comments section of the article, the ImageMaster credits.txt contains a link to MS source, while I haven't bothered to download the linked SDK, its a safe bet that the reason the code looks the same is because it probably is, ImageMaster PROBABLY pulled that function from an MS example. It happens ALL THE TIME.
There is no MS conspiracy, just some douche bag blogger wanting to get posted on the front page of slashdot to increase his ad revenue.
The proper thing to do is to remove this story from the front page to deny that traffic to him.
Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
I have, it's the comapny's way of saying 'thank you'.
please re-read what I said in my OP and try and understand it, obviously you didn't understand it the first time because I never said MS has the right to use the code.
I did read it, especially where you say Microsoft as a corporation is the victim here TBH. You excuse MS without excusing others.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
> Why is it that the only copyright violations that upset the /. masses are those involving code under the GPL?
Because Slashdotters care about sharing and infringing upon the GPL harms that. Many of us don't give a used fig about copyrights in and of themselves.
The IBM anti-trust case lasted for 13 years, IBM did everything in their power to slow down the investigation.
Yes, after reading the original letter I have one: how does that letter prove that Microsoft is evil? The only thing Gates is saying is that he and his company has invested around $40000 in building and supporting the software, and the return was so small, it was just enough to break even.
Um Microsoft hasn't exactly done so badly has it now? You could only claim to have just barely broken even founding and running Microsoft with some VERY creative accounting. Like writing off hookers, beer and multi-million dollar mansions and cars as business expenses. I suppose we should all feel very sorry for the CEOs who after all only pay themselves $1 a year in salary. Would YOU work for just $1 a year (and a few hundred billion in stock)?
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
Because stealing BSD-licensed code is boring ;-)
NB: The message above might reflect my opinion right now, but not necessarily tomorrow or next year.
So all MS should do is publish the source code as an Automatic Update, and then they've complied with the GPL, yes ?
If they played it right, they could win some kudos ... maybe not here of course, thise is /.
Because GPL violations are wrong as opposed to many other copyright violations.
Some of my favourite people are from th US; Vonnegut, Chomsky, Bill Hicks.
Patents on the other hand dont protect the implementation, they protect the idea/process that is being implemented.
Patent do protect specific implementations of ideas, not the ideas themselves.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
Copyright protects a particular expression of an idea, not the idea itself. You're thinking of patents, which are completely different.
And you misunderstand patents. Look at my reply to the post above yours. Especially see what Findlaw says about patents.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
Because people are making money off it.
Because the people violating that copyright are invariably the same people campaigning for the death penalty for other copyright violations.
There are other, less obvious rteasons. But in summary, there are a lot of differences between the two situations, assuming you're comparing this and the mp3 issue.
Breaking Into the Industry - A development log about starting a game studio.
Because, unlike average Joe downloading a torrent, they involve commercial redistribution.
Uh, no just a matter of age.
They are the victim of buying bad code how hard is that to understand? Yes there are things they could have done to prevent it but that is the same thing as saying its a rape victims fault for getting raped because they didn't carry a gun.
I stand by my statement that the "company" is a victim of a very small few individuals actions.
The DVD burner tool is not sold, it's available freely for download. It's for burning a Windows 7 DVD and just that. BTW: downloaded Imagemaster, and it's a viable alternative to Alcohol (minus the mounting). Way better than Infrarecorder.
either. No free redistribution, derived works, or anything. Just because the source code is available doesn't make something open source.
And only OSI can define what open source is?
While the term "open source" was coined by the Open Source Initiative source code was open, visible to see, study, and modify as early as the 1960s. The hackers of the Tech Model Railroad Club at MIT in the '60s was posting their source code on boards for anyone to improve and optimize.
But then again that was before "hackers" was used as a negative word.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
Can we disable MS's internet access?
Its not that we hate copyrights except for ones for GPL
We just think that its wrong for microsoft to sell a product, which steals functionality from a free one.
How can you steal something that's free?
I stand by my statement that the "company" is a victim of a very small few individuals actions.
And I stand by my statement that you single out MS in excusing their actions. It's alright if MS uses code without following the code's license but MS can accuse others of using it's own code.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
If you don't mind working for $2 an hour, that's ok of course, but most people probably wouldn't go to the university to learn computer science if their pay was less than that of a mcdonalds employee.
Well, then, good news for Gates. He did pretty well for a dropout, and remarkably well for someone who is constantly being ripped off. Or perhaps the facts are a little distorted? You'd be surprised to learn that many companies don't even do so well as to break even in their first few years.
Sure I'm paranoid, but am I paranoid enough?
A lot of us disapprove of the concept of copyright, and approve of the freedom to use and modify code. The GPL is a neat hack that enforces this latter freedom, but does so using copyright law. Ideally, I think that many of us (well, me at least) would like to see copyright drastically curtailed, but the freedom to modify software ensured by other means.[1]
[1] This could be very simple: say, a law stating that if you release software commercially, you must make the source code available. It's similar in concept to a law stating that the ingredients of a foodstuff must be listed on the label.
Why is that? Why is it OK to violate my copyright but wrong to violate the GPL?
Maybe I am very young, but I seem to recall Gary Kildall having a few words to say about both Microsoft and IBM in this era of liberation you speak of. Something about Microsoft stealing CP/M through a thinly veiled Seattle Computer Products?
Just a guess, but it is probably the difference between stealing from a bank and stealing from a charity.
Although in this analogy it would be like a bank stealing from a charity. *shrugs*
You are clearly an idiot. Quote from me:
"What I said is "Microsoft" probably didn't know about, authorize or condone the use of (GPL)open source code. That does not mean it is OK that it did happen."
Yeah, that sounds like I clearly think MS should be in the clear. By me saying MS is a victim it implies I think they are still liable for what happened. You are also continuing to prove my point by throwing around the "their actions." statement. Microsoft employs almost 100,000 people, mistakes or slip ups by small number or individuals does not equate to corporate sponsorship or policy which. Corporate policies or attitudes can be refereed to as 'their'. You don't say McDonalds is a dick company that promotes being dicks because one time you had a dick drive through operator.
Surely if a open source developer slipped MS code in a project that *individual* would be the one to blame, not the project or the whole open source community? Correct?
You are displaying irrational MS hating behaviors. This is a situation where Microsoft could clearly be legally liable but that doesn't mean the corporation meant to do what they did nor does it mean they are evil. It means a few people didn't do their jobs and will likely lose their jobs IF it even turns out they copied anything.
It looks like Microsoft's defence will be that the EULA says ""You may not reverse engineer, decompile or disassemble the software". They'll probably charge the guy with a DMCA violation...
Legally speaking, what does it mean to disassemble a program? Is it to convert its machine representation into a more readable format? Every processor in every computer does this, it just disassembles to a language that is not composed of English words and numbers. \
If someone owns Visual Studio and another program on their system crashes, what happens? A little dialog box asks the user if they want to debug. If they say yes, Visual Studio fires up with a disassembly view of the program that crashed!
Isn't the entire Wine project basically reverse engineering the Windows APIs?
I object to anyone who turns a profit on copyright infringement, but not to the infringement itself. If you want to violate the GPL so you can have ZFS in your linux and then distribute it illegally, this is fine by me. Whether you're a DVD peddler on the street or Microsoft or a small business pirating Office, I object to that.
93rd rule of Slashdot: No matter how obvious my sarcasm is, my comment will be taken seriously by someone.
You make it sound like the evilness (read: utter lack of ethics) were a funny meme, not a plain, cold fact.
Want to hear the voice of GOD? cat
The difference is that they didn't license the GPL'd code.
Want to hear the voice of GOD? cat
Because the moral position of the "Slashdot Masses" tends to be the belief that information should be freely shared. The GPL uses copyright as a legal trick to enforce sharing, so violation of that is seen as bad. The big recording and movie companies use copyright to prevent sharing, and so violation of it is seen as morally justifiable.
You're getting hung up on copyright - the moral position is based on the idea of sharing and is not hypocritical at all when seen in that light. If you are using your copyright to prevent sharing, it is perfectly morally justifiable to violate it. If you are using it to promote or enforce sharing, violation is morally bad.
The same way you can enslave a person who is Free.
Replying to negate bad modding.
"..."
"Yep - it's not like they have never done anything like that before (Stacker)."
That was about violating patents, not copying code.
If you really wanted to see if the code was the same without having the original source code, wouldn't the smart thing be to use the same decompiler on the compiled versions of both?
Otherwise, you're comparing apples to applesauce... they may both be forms of spple, but they don't look the same.
GLaDOS for President 2016! "Well here we are again. It's always such a pleasure." -- GLaDOS, 2011
"But IBM *did* actually reform."
Really, how so?
"By whom?"
Anyone who didn't buy an IBM brand PC would be a candidate.
The issue changes completely when copyright infringement is done for commercial uses. Then you're getting money for work someone else did; *directly* depriving them of it.
"They did it -- without IBM parts!"
Yes, because we know that all of IBM's computers before the PC were made up exclusively of IBM parts. You should have seen their steel foundry in those days - impressive!
IBM was a lot more street-savvy as well. MS thought they didn't need to contribute money to politicians, IBM new better.
Now MS learned their lesson from the antitrust case - you must pay the protection money if you want the government off your back.
IF MS (or some company like them) never existed chances are we'd be paying $5000 for our 286 machines exclusively sold by IBM. Or perhaps we'd paying $10000 for the newest mac model.
You're calling me an idiot and I'm the one displaying irrational hating behaviors?
Calling names is irrational.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
Or is it that non-commercial violations of copyrights aren't that upsetting, but commercial violations are?
I don't remember a great many people rushing to the defense of the guy trying to sell Beatle's music by violating copyrights, even though he was going against a big label.
So you're saying that MS is forcing the code to do what MS wants rather than what it wants to do?
You see how ridiculous this anthropomorphism of code sounds?
So basically you're not principle-based, but you know what you like.
It's not hypocritical "from a certain point of view".
You enjoy that freedom as well.
Just wondering. Hence, the question. Are you feeling guilty? Did you steal code from work? You seem to have taken the question a little personal.
Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong fix.
So because an employer says you can't, you think it doesn't happen? What if I applied that to the other side of the argument? Because GPL says Microsoft can't leverage the code they way they are suspected of doing, it didn't happen?
Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong fix.
And all of those with a clue realised Compaq was the company that turned IBM PCs into commodity computers.
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
No doubt they used Compaq-DOS.
A lot of people take home office supplies because they think the company should be thanking them.
Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong fix.
That's crap. You do too take something away - you take away the renumeration you should have paid.
That's crap. Not giving something is not the same as taking something away.
And "renumeration" is not a word.
Freedom is the principle.
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
Clever people.
Sounds like a win/win...
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
I think the best you can say is that the GPL is the principle. The GPL uses a too narrow definition of freedom to have it be its principle.
I believe he may have been implying that the exact opposite could easily be true. Someone working at a company (for simplicity's sake, lets say Microsoft) and leaves. They then do some GPL contributions using code they wrote for their past employer. I'm not saying this is exactly the case, but it easily could be. TFA leaves a large amount of reasonable doubt in defense of Microsoft. He'll require a lot more to prove it. I believe in this country, you're innocent til proven guilty. You'll need a lot more than circumstantial evidence here.
I disagree that different laws mean the underlying crimes are different.
Drunk driving was reckless driving before we started passing laws that specifically outlawed drunk driving.
Texting and driving was reckless driving before we started passing laws... get the point? Something can already be illegal and the politicians just have to write some stupid new law that makes them look tough on something that's already illegal.
That said, I do agree that infringing copyright != depriving of property.
...copyright infringement isn't stealing something physical as in all your cases.
The parent mentioned stocks, which are not something physical. They represent ownership in corporations which only exist because of our laws and are worth a market determined amount of money which is also a symbolic object created by our laws. Copyright is just another "thing" that would not exists if not for our laws.
I don't always use unix-like operating systems; but when I do, I prefer FreeBSD.
When we speak of free software, we are referring to freedom, not price. Our General Public Licenses are designed to make sure that you have the freedom to distribute copies of free software (and charge for them if you wish), that you receive source code or can get it if you want it, that you can change the software or use pieces of it in new free programs, and that you know you can do these things.
To protect your rights, we need to prevent others from denying you these rights or asking you to surrender the rights. Therefore, you have certain responsibilities if you distribute copies of the software, or if you modify it: responsibilities to respect the freedom of others.
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
And you know *why* that is? Because *IT'S NOT THE SAME*
Copyright infringement was being denounced as piracy while the Black Flag still flew over the Caribbean.
The NET act [No Electronic Theft] - passed and signed into law in 1997-98 - is a contemporary example of why the geek cannot hope to win this war on words.
In the American federal system ordinary criminal jurisdiction is state and local.
You'd have to dig quite deep into the federal criminal code to find any mention of theft at all.
If it comforts the geek that he hasn't been charged with theft -
conviction on the felony charge still reduces his horizons to a 6x8 cinder block cell and a bunk mate named Big Mike.
No, there was a cheap and nasty OS based on a hacked version of CP/M that came with the original IBM PCs.
When the PC and PC clone market took off, the company making it went along for the ride. They got lucky.
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
You think IBM touting Linux on some of their servers is reform? I see you've never dealt with their storage, mainframe, or global services business units.
i mean like 500 different listing exists for windows on the pirates bay.......
Given that they were able to do so solely because of their negotiation with IBM, I'd say they made their own luck.
In any case, a PC-DOS-compatible OS was just as important to the clone business as the BIOS, probably more since the OS would evolve a lot faster than the BIOS.
Yes, as your copy/paste illustrates the GPL has a narrow definition of freedom.
"But IBM *did* actually reform."
Really, how so?
IBM really were a malign force in this industry when they were dominant, using grossly unethical tactics against competitors and stifling innovation to an extraordinary extent. Between 1960 and 1980 IBM were the evil empire - probably worse than Microsoft have ever been. These days, ethically, IBM seems to be an 'average company'. It does some good stuff, it acts on the whole as a good citizen, it contributes to standards processes and mostly abides by the standards that are agreed. Of course, this may simply be because it no longer has the power to bully and intimidate like it once did - but this is nevertheless a huge change.
However, 'better' does not necessarily mean 'good', particularly if you start from where IBM started from.
And being 'not quite as bad as IBM at it's worst' doesn't make Microsoft good, either - they have always, from the very beginning, been an exceptionally unethical company.
I'm old enough to remember when discussions on Slashdot were well informed.
Saved your life!
See, I was going to kill you but I didn't, so I saved your life.
Yes, after reading the original letter I have one: how does that letter prove that Microsoft is evil? The only thing Gates is saying is that he and his company has invested around $40000 in building and supporting the software, and the return was so small, it was just enough to break even. The pay, he states, was $2 an hour. If you don't mind working for $2 an hour, that's ok of course, but most people probably wouldn't go to the university to learn computer science if their pay was less than that of a mcdonalds employee.
And what *was* minimum wage in 1980? Looks like about $3 (http://oregonstate.edu/instruct/anth484/minwage.html). But how many startups are running on effectively 0 cash during their initial phases?
antipaucity
Sorry if I sounded harsh, but your comment sounded a bit like those unprovable claims that Linux was "infringing on SCOs copyrights"
And as you know, you don't need to provide proof for those allegations, you just need to state them in order for them to become FUD ...oh, and for the record, I don't code for a living, and my only contributions to FOSS consist of the occasional bug report, so no guilty feelings here....
No sig for the moment.
Wow, you have a real problem with parsing sentences.
Because it is our code!
Because you see the masses as one, rather than the shifting clusters of opinion groups they are.
No, it was the HARDWARE that mattered. ALL of the suppliers for IBM PCs benefited from the open architecture and off-the-shelf components. Intel has arguably received as much as Microsoft from the "IBM Compatible" business.
At the time, DOS wasn't much more than a bootloader.
For performance reasons, many popular software applications for the IBM-PC bypassed MS-DOS and even the computer's ROM BIOS, and directly wrote to memory and peripherals. For example, a program might directly update the video refresh memory, instead of using MS-DOS calls and device drivers to alter the appearance of the screen. Many such important software packages, (such as the spreadsheet program Lotus 1-2-3, and Microsoft's own Microsoft Flight Simulator 1.0) and especially games, that directly accessed the IBM-PC's hardware, bypassing the BIOS, did not work on computers that were even trivially different from the IBM-PC. So the systems that were not 100% IBM-PC compatible also quickly became just as obsolete as the other completely incompatible systems.
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
Microsoft is evil. Always has been. Always will be.
the Corporation of Microsoft behaves in an aberrant, selfish fashion. If there is GPL code that is being misused, it is not because "Microsoft is Evil', but more likely because they hired a contractor who lifted some open source code and though it would not get noticed. MS may be sociopathic and short sighted, but they are not going to as a official policy do something like this.
I have said it before here, Microsoft does some really stupid shit. Don't just assume that everything that looks bad is their fault though. That is just being lazy.
HA! I just wasted some of your bandwidth with a frivolous sig!
Why is it that the only copyright violations that upset the /. masses are those involving code under the GPL?
Result of copyright enforcement abuse: Less stuff in the public domain.
Result of proper GPL usage: More software available for public use.
No, some companies try to make good products.
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
Proprietary format/protocol lockin.
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
I hereby copyright this article and all comments under the -99999 PCL (pedantic comments license) all comments and or random crazy speculation is property (c) Anonymous Coward 2009 (c)
investors
Find something complex. This is just too simple to claim copying. Sadly the OP has lost all credibility by making the claim.
Why is it that the only copyright violations that upset the /. masses are those involving code under the GPL?
You don't kill Bambi .. but it OK to kill other animals. It's all about cuteness. Linux is cute. Windows is ugly.
Besides, if the GPL stuff is free, then you really are a mongrel if you abuse it. They were really nice to you and you kicked them in the teeth. Bad you!
But the proprietary folk are waging war against us users - it's producer versus consumer in a no-holds-barred contest of wills and greed. And all's fair when you are fighting a greedy corporate monster - it is just self-defence. They will shaft you too when they get an opportunity.
See Windows is founded on greed, so it begets greed in the user - equal opposite forces. But the GPL is founded on giving and freedom, and it rightly expects the same back.
I am anarch of all I survey.
No, it doesn't.
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
"Are you feeling guilty? Did you steal code from work? You seem to have taken the question a little personal." What a lame and trollish attempt at an attack. So, still the question is: "Your point is? Do you have an accusation to make?"
Keep your own sig in mind...
No, some companies try to make good products.
Which is one of the best ways of beating out the competition.
Can you imagine the amount of code theft that will be discovered if this ever gets to court?
Almost every part of Windows has some amount of stolen code.
I am the unwilling control for my Origin.
A friend of mine once pointed out to me that the best Microsoft products weren't actually made by them: mice, keyboards, etc. They are all (according to him) all products made by someone else with Microsoft's name on it.
This was about ten years ago. I doubt that much has changed since then.
When politicians are involved, everyone loses.
As I recall, IBM sort of invited their own competition by making the schematics for the IBM PC openly available.
Microsoft never made a computer of their own (that I know of). Their efforts have largely been aimed at software.
When politicians are involved, everyone loses.
I have the negative experience of using both to this day, and I am still using both at the same time. Both are really crap. Outlook is after on loading time and has good Windows integration. Notes is heavier, but I don't need to switch between 10 different applications, because Notes is THE collaboration application. (I happen to use Notes 8)
Don't lie! Based on all your comments in this thread, you weren't "just wondering." You were trolling your opinion that it happens, but don't want to provide any evidence for that assertion.
This could really spoil the image of Microsoft. http://www.cypress.com/
It's a subtle difference - but a company that wants to beat the competition is one that does not care about the product or the competition. A company that wants to make good products may or may not beat the competition, but if they do it is a side effect of excellence not a driving goal.
Microsoft internal emails show that they want to "win", and to do so they are willing to break laws. So far they have been shown that the benefits of their behavior (killing off competition, increasing revenue) far outweigh the costs they have to pay (several million to the remains of stacker and DR-DOS as example). In other words, they have found a "best way of beating out the competition" from their perspective only.
Excluding the XBox, Microsoft did try to define a reference hardware platform in the '80s. The MSX http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MSX was built by several Japanese and European companies.
How can you steal something that's free?
If I am giving away free cookies, one per person. They are free cookies, yet if someone walks up and say "hmm, these are free, so I'm not stealing if I take them all" they have stolen. And there is measurable loss
- everyone else who would have received a cookie, didn't.
- I will have to spend time explaining to everyone who expected a cookie why they won't get one.
I realize that this doesn't line up with the example of MS using GPL code, their taking hasn't reduced the available amount of GPL code. However, they are taking something (albeit free) and using it in a way that the owner did not approve of. Just because the owner didn't see monitory value in their property, does not mean that it had none. In the case of GPL code, the owners see value in making the source code available to all. And Microsoft is denying them that value.
And yes, I realize many will not understand, try substituting "car" for "cookie" in the above analogy.
I'm guessing because of the double-speak and hipocrisy.
I mean, if I pirate windows, I'm a terrorist. If MSFT pirates random GPL software, they should not get off easy. And they even make money off of it!
If copyright infringement *WAS* the same as theft, we wouldn't need a special law dealing with it - it could be covered by theft laws. The fact that it isn't should tell you something.
No it does not tell me something. Laws sometimes are added to clarify existing laws. For example, we had laws stating that using a lethal weapon to kill someone is illegal. Those laws have specific punishments, as opposed to the punishment for accidentally killing some. Yet, we now have laws that specify that killing someone with a car can be considered to be use of a lethal weapon (still have to show intent, just like with a gun). Adding the laws stating that using a car to kill someone is the same as using a lethal weapon doesn't mean that a car is different from a gun when used for the deliberate intent of killing someone. It means that someone used a car to deliberately kill someone and then had a lawyer try to weasel out of the stricter punishment. In other words, the law was passed to clarify that though some might wish to be able to use a car to dispose of their nagging wife, they can't say "it's a car not a gun".
likewise, the laws passed to clarify that copyright infringement is equivalent to theft comes from the fact that someone probably tired to rationalize their actions as not theft.
IF MS (or some company like them) never existed chances are we'd be paying $5000 for our 286 machines exclusively sold by IBM. Or perhaps we'd paying $10000 for the newest mac model.
Or perhaps we would be paying about what we are paying now for something secure and reliable and about as fast.
All Microsoft did was make people believe that crashes and insecurity are normal and that computers can't really be trusted.
MS's major contribution was to facilitate the making of PC clones which lead to lower prices and improved performance.
The commodity nature of PC's was a necessary requirement for the creation and success of Linux.
Look we obviously disagree but you didn't really think that quoting dogma that everybody is familiar with was going to change anyone's mind did you?
I don't know what their motivation was for puplishing the schematics, but if their intent was to encourage clones they would have released all the IP required in the public domain.
Yes, many early programs bypassed both DOS and the BIOS as well. However, many more did not and if you made a clone that couldn't handle DOS it would have crashed and burned very quickly.
Actually, You need to come to terms with the fact that copyright infringement is not theft. The supreme court has ruled that it is not theft.
in Dowling v United States, the supreme court made this ruling:
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Most people, other than those that simply refuse to, acknowledge that if something *can* happen, it probably will. Yes, proving it is another issue, but we all know bittoreent *can* be used to commit copyright infringement, but only a fool would argue that it never happens because it's not proven that it does.
I am aware of at least 20 different incidents were GPL code was used and passed off by a programmer as his own work. This was mostly code written for internal purposes, so it doesn't matter from a GPL enforcement perspective, but it does happen.
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I am waging war by selling a product to someone who wants it?
You're accusations are ridiculous. No wonder you never get a reply.
Who would he be making the accusations against?
What of it?
People who don't like seeing their open code used in a closed environment, relicensed to be unusable by others.
I am not devoid of humor.
Innovating after someone innovates first is called copying, mimicing or depending on situation plagiarism.
Japanese are well known for copying and then improving the said consept and optimising it
MS is know for taking other peoples ideas (apple for ex.) and making the end result worse.
What microsoft did better was marketing.
Your mind is, as you say, closed. Anyone who can make themselves believe that a very practical response to a very real problem is "dogma", is beyond help.
I posted the quote from the GPL to remind everybody just how important it has been, not just in creating free software, but also in preserving it.
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
Unlike the provable claims that you are a freeloading spic that needs to drown in the Gulf. I think I speak for all of Slashdot when I say that we are all sick of your wetback comments. If you're not going to get out of this country, at least get out of Slashdot. Not one needs your beaner shit. BTW 8 niggers fucked your daughter in the ass at the same time.
A company that wants to make good products may or may not beat the competition, but if they do it is a side effect of excellence not a driving goal.
If you think there's any public limited company anywhere that is like that you're very naïve. It's a company's legal responsibility to try increase profits, doing so means beating the competition. Simple as that.
Also, to suggest that Microsoft does not make good products is massively naïve. Office is not the number one out there because it sucks. Windows is not the number one because it crashes all the time. Exchange is not massively popular because it has no useful features at all. Just like all other companies, MS produces products that they think are competitive, and they try to beat the competition.
I don't particularly like MS personally, I prefer Apple products, but both companies do nothing but produce products that can compete, and try to beat each other out.
So, you're saying that installing Microsoft Office, TPB edition is stealing because it has the exact same effect on Microsofts income as installing Open Office?
If someone steals a Ford, it's not stealing because Ford didn't get paid, just as it's not stealing from Ford to buy a Dodge. Stealing a Ford is stealing because someone don't have that Ford any more.
I didn't think they actually meant that they were _taking_ ideas from folks...well I guess there's the truth in marketing.
His points about rootkit.com putting out code they said can unhook the windows firewall is not ridiculous. It is actually good he pointed that out to Microsoft people in Foredecker I would think at least. The ac apk makes a point that is also difficult to deny in hosts files being larger now that 0 is not allowed as a blocking address in a host file, because the files that now use 0.0.0.0 or 127.0.0.1 only in Vista since 12-09-08 and in Windows Server 2008 and Windows 7 will be larger line by line and produce a larger file. Larger files load slower than smaller ones do so he does have a logical point considering files are read as the ac apk noted, which is mostly in a while loop, character per chracter and line by line until a enter keypress is found, then lastly stopping at the end of file record. You are out of line stating what you had to the ac apk.
Reflector shows what the code output by the compiler looks like. It does not show what the code looks like in source control or before compiling. It is possible to write a section of code in numerous ways, yet still get the same compiler optimized code.
Then there is the simple fact that for basic methods, there is a high likely hood that a similar method has been written at some point. There are only so many ways to write a buffer read operation for example.
Good point!
It isn't like you denied the copyright holder any of their possessions
You denied them their money; which absolutely is something of value. Furthermore, you devalued the work as a whole. See stock market for a better lesson in reality.
Simple fact is, piracy is a form of stealing. Pirates are thieves. They harm large and small businesses which trickles down to everyone. In turn, just like all theft, others are left to pay higher prices to cover the losses incurred by scumbag thieves. That's the facts. That's reality.
If you need to lie to yourself to make yourself feel better, so you can continue to rationalize theft, then do so, but stop lying to everyone else. It just makes you look like an idiot.
Pretty clearly you need to learn to read. It absolutely is theft. Now take that comment, learn to read, and re-read my original post. You'll quickly find you look like a complete douche bag given the context of your reply. If it still doesn't click after that, you're dumber than a bag of hammers. Seriously.
No. The supreme court is very clear. Copyright infringement is the "invasion of a statutory defined privince", which makes it closer to trespassing than theft.
Would you call a trespasser a theif? No, you wouldn't.
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Instead of pointing out a potential oversight, MS is accused of "stealing" right out of the gate. Good job folks. Way to encourage vendor participation in your projects. Keep it up and you will ensure OSS remains in the dark corners of IS - appliances, the occasional web server. It will never see critical mass unless people learn to work with vendors whose employees may not be completely familiar with all of the rules yet.
You cannot steal code.
You can steal the book the code is written in.
Or the disk the code is on.
Or you can make a copy of it.
You can even make a binary conversion of the code (which is a kind of copy).
But it is not stealing
It is copying
You make it sound like the evilness (read: utter lack of ethics) were a funny meme, not a plain, cold fact.
Because... You know... Microsoft is Evil: Get the facts.
"I see undead people" Warcraft III - Necromancer
Drunk driving was reckless driving before we started passing laws that specifically outlawed drunk driving.
No, reckless driving is nothing more and nothing less than reckless driving. That law doesn't care what your BAC is, all that matters is that you are still in control of the car.
I've said as much myself.
http://perens.com/SCO/SCOSlideShow.html
This link does not say SCO showed code from System V they owned in Linux. One peace of code they showed is in the Berkeley Packet Filter which has a BSD license. Other code mentioned was copyrighted by ATT then released by Caldera, what SCO formerly was called, with a BSD license.
http://www.lemis.com/grog/SCO/code-comparison.html
So far there's "This point is crucial to the reason that I initially came to the wrong conclusion. As it stands, the code is not System V code. In fact, as we'll see below, it is derived from System V in exactly the way I describe."..."SCO is incorrect in claiming that the code in question has been lifted from System V.4 without changes, but that doesn't change the fact that it obviously comes from System V.4."
The author, Greg Lehey, goes through SCO's claims and disputes each one. Now that's a short page so Greg Lehey probably didn't cover every SCO claim. So SCO may of disclosed some code, but do they step up to the light of day?
And that's disregarding the fact that Novell not SCO owns the System V code.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
Your accusation is ridiculous. You don't offer who/what/when/where/why the ac apk's warnings and proofs from reputable sources and a test that anyone who can code can perform easily enough. His proofs aren't ridiculous as you said they were. If anyone replying here looks ridiculous, it is you.