Half of GitHub Code Unsafe To Use (If You Want Open Source)

WebMink writes "GitHub is a great open source hosting site, right? Wrong. There's no requirement that projects on GitHub provide any copyright license, let alone an open source one, so roughly half the projects on GitHub are "all rights reserved" — meaning you could well be violating copyright if you make any use of the code in them. And GitHub management seem just fine with this state of affairs, saying picking a license is too hard for ordinary developers. But if you're not going to give anyone permission to use your code, why post it on GitHub in the first place?"

Comments

Unsafe?

[Anonymous Coward]

Code having a license term, you use it under that license. Whats the problem. So you can't cut an paste it. Good. But as a example of an implementation its still very useful/educational.

The license chosen isup to the author, get over it. This militant 'I want it all for free and without me having to do anything' is your problem, not the authors.

Re:Unsafe?

[SwashbucklingCowboy]

"But as a example of an implementation its still very useful/educational."

And opens you up to the possibility of being accused of creating a derivative work, which violates "All Rights Reserved".

Bitbucket

[akeeneye]

As is Bitbucket (bitbucket.org), with the added bonus that the private repos that you create there are free too.

Re:Why post it on GitHub?

[Neil_Brown]

When in the recent past have you seen a court rule on copyright with common sense?

I'm not sure that Usedsoft applied common sense, but rather some convoluted reasoning, but the outcome seems sensible enough. Picking on rulings relevant here, I think the US court's decision in Wallace v. IBM was common sense, as was the finding of the German court in Welte v. Skype.

Perhaps look also at Griggs v. Evans — a pragmatic decision on the facts, to my mind.

Sure, there are some odd judgments, but there are some sensible, practical judges out there too.

People misunderstanding the point of Github?

[flimflammer]

I think so!

The public repository option for uploading makes no mention that you need to supply the code with a copyleft/copyright free license, just that the code is publicly listed and browsable. Why are people assuming that everyone is supposed to?

Are people confusing open source (publicly browsable source) from Open Source (the movement)?

Re:Missing the problem here

[phantomfive]

Just because I choose to use github to store my repositories (and, in my case, I use and pay for private repositories for those things that I don't want to share) does not mean that I want everyone in the world to download and use my stuff.

Just so you know, in the terms-and-services you clicked on when you signed up for github, you actually gave permission to everyone in the world to download, view, and fork your stuff. So if that's not what you want, you might reconsider your use of github (Note: this only applies to the free public repositories).

StackOverflow is even worse!

[zidium]

Every question, answer, and comment on the StackExchange websites (StackOverflow, ServerFault, et. al.) is automatically licensed on something very akin to the GPL (the Creative Commons Share Alike License); if you use code from those sites, your entire application's source will legally have to be released.

Just because no one is talking about that doesn't mean it isn't legit. Check it out: http://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/25956/what-is-up-with-the-source-code-license-on-stack-overflow

Re:Terms of github

[phantomfive]

You've got it backwards. If you sue me for copyright infringement, you need to prove that I infringed, I don't need to prove that I didn't. So good luck proving that by forking and redistributing the code that you put on github, I've made unjust profits or caused you losses.