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Wordpress Founder Accuses Wix Of Stealing Code (ma.tt)
An anonymous reader writes:
"Wow, dude I did not even know we were fighting," Wix CEO Avishai Abrahami posted on the company's blog Saturday -- responding to Wordpress creator Matt Mullenweg, who on Friday accused Wix of stealing their code. "The claim is that the Wix mobile apps distribute GPL code and aren't themselves GPL, so they violate the license," Mullenweg wrote.
Abrahami argued that "Everything we improved there or modified, we submitted back as open source," adding "we will release the app you saw as well... " Mullenweg responded "It appears you and [lead engineer] Tal might share a misunderstanding of how the GPL works," ultimately adding "software licensing can be tricky and many people make honest mistakes."
Wix had also argued they're giving back to the open source community by listing 224 public projects on their GitHub page. "Thank you for the offer to use them," Mullenweg responded. "If we do, we'll make sure to follow the license you've put on the code very carefully."
Abrahami argued that "Everything we improved there or modified, we submitted back as open source," adding "we will release the app you saw as well... " Mullenweg responded "It appears you and [lead engineer] Tal might share a misunderstanding of how the GPL works," ultimately adding "software licensing can be tricky and many people make honest mistakes."
Wix had also argued they're giving back to the open source community by listing 224 public projects on their GitHub page. "Thank you for the offer to use them," Mullenweg responded. "If we do, we'll make sure to follow the license you've put on the code very carefully."
MOST embedded operating systems and compilers and libraries used by MOST companies are in fact GPL. Linux runs in almost ALL embedded systems like TV sets, BluRay players from Sony,LG,Samsung,Sharp,Panasonic,NEC,etc..., Every single Android Cellphone and Tablet ever made. Most automation systems use GPL tools in their compilers Like AMX,Crestron,TI,Intel, and all the little players like Samung Smartthings, Wink, etc.... In fact it's hard to find a company NOT using a GPL codebase somewhere, even Microsoft does.
So I really think you need to update your knowledge of what businesses are using, because it seems the entirety of all you know about it is from 1995.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
People who READ the GPL can figure it out. Those who INTERPRET it to suit their own agenda get it wrong (...) If you publish a program that incorporates GPL (not LGPL) source
Actually I'd say it is a mess, not because of the GPL but the way software works. Any time you make a function, you make an interface. Any time you have an interface, you can have multiple implementations that don't really derivate from each other. Principally there's no difference between the Linux kernel's user API, module API and internal API. It's just ways for code to call other code. Or an application and plug-ins. Or a command line tool and a GUI. Or a service and its administration tool. What about interpreted languages, web services, JVMs and so on if you call it, you incorporate it?
They try to exclude some bits:
However, as a special exception, the source code distributed need not include anything that is normally distributed (in either source or binary form) with the major components (compiler, kernel, and so on) of the operating system on which the executable runs, unless that component itself accompanies the executable.
What if you're making a set top box, could you distribute an open source tool on a proprietary OS if they accompany each other?
The FSF is admitting this is a bit wobbly:
Where's the line between two separate programs, and one program with two parts? This is a legal question, which ultimately judges will decide. We believe that a proper criterion depends both on the mechanism of communication (exec, pipes, rpc, function calls within a shared address space, etc.) and the semantics of the communication (what kinds of information are interchanged).
If the program dynamically links plug-ins, but the communication between them is limited to invoking the âmainâ(TM) function of the plug-in with some options and waiting for it to return, that is a borderline case.
And these questions presume the plug-in knows what's on the other side of the interface.
Can I apply the GPL when writing a plug-in for a non-free program?
Can I release a non-free program that's designed to load a GPL-covered plug-in?
What if it's a standard? Say for the sake of argument both Photoshop and GIMP had a common tool plug-in. Could you legally write GPL plug-ins for it? Proprietary plug-ins? Could they live together on a CD?
A modern service bus or something like that really makes a mess of the simple compiled/linked world of the GPL.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
I feel that the viral licensing clauses in GPL v3 will ultimately hinder the further development of software.
While Apple (as an example) were using GPL v2 licensed code, they were actively contributing patches and changes back to the relevant projects. This was good, it meant that we had professional developers who were paid to work on these projects and the changes they made were contributed back upstream.
Now that no corporation can touch any GPL v3 licensed code, we now have fragmentation and less developers working on open source code bases.
Apple, for example, have had to implement their own SMB stack as smbx, instead of using Samba. For a number of years, SMB compatibility and functionality took a huge step backwards on OS X, all because the Samba project started to use GPL v3. This ended up with developers who would have been working on patches and changes for Samba, instead working on their own closed-source implementation that, quite frankly, was nowhere near as good or as mature as Samba. The end result of this was that Apple's customers suffered with a sub par product and the Samba project suffered with fewer people contributing to it.
Who then benefits from GPL v3?
Specialist Mac support for creative pros, Melbourne
If you include GPL v3 code in your closed source project, under the terms of the licence agreement, you must comply with the licence which demands either you licence the software or you release ALL of the source of your closed-source project under the GPL v3.
If you are producing a large, closed-source, product, option 1 is not an option at all.
If you can't negotiate a licence with the copyright holders, or the copyright holders are unwilling to licence it to you on terms that are acceptable to both parties then option 2 is not an option at all.
So, this leaves only option 3 - remove all GPL'd code from your project and write your own.
Specialist Mac support for creative pros, Melbourne