Young man (seeing Churchill leaving the bathroom without washing his hands): At Eton they taught us to wash our hands after using the toilet.
Churchill: At Harrow they taught us not to piss on our hands.
It is not the urine that is a concern but rather the bacteria on your junk which gets transferred to your hands. I assume that you touch your junk when you take a piss and that you walk around wearing cloths. Bacteria tends to grow during the day in the nether regions which is why it is good to take a shower every day and why you should wash your hands after taking a piss.
I'm sorry but you obviously have know knowledge of how.net works. It is syntax agnostic, you can write exactly the same functionality in both syntaxes and both syntaxes access all the same functionality. It doesn't matter what syntax you write in, they both do the same thing and you can program equally badly(or well) in both.
I'm sorry but I do know how.NET works..NET merely provides a framework/abstraction layer to the underlying OS APIs. There is nothing that you can do in.NET that you could not do outside of it but the framework just makes some things easier to do.
Syntax can be very influential on coding style and code quality.
I see no advantage for non-VB programmer to use VB.NET since everything you can do in VB.NET can be done in C#. I also feel that any advantages of familiarity of syntax that VB.NET brings to VB programmers is outweighed by the potential for bad programming practices being brought over from their VB 6 days. VB is a horrid syntax and needs to die.
Having experience with languages like Java or C# allows you to pick up either language quickly as well as other languages.
In my career, I have moved through the following languages: C/C++, Clipper, Perl, VFP (6-9), C#, Java and Python. In my current project I have code in the following languages: C#, Python and Java. The latter is only used for unit testing rules against a rules engine.
Out of all of those languages that I mentioned, only C/C++ and Clipper were languages that I learned while in school and everything else was picked up on the job. I never found a use for Assembly or COBOL in my career so far.
C# and VB.Net are two different syntaxes for using the same common runtime library. Arguing about whether C# is better or worse than VB.Net is the height of language snobbery. What matters is the.Net library underneath. The only reason to prefer one over the other is because you happen to prefer one syntax over the other.
Sorry but if are going to call yourself a "professional" developer then you should know the syntax of Java and/or C#. Once you know one of those languages then you should be able to move between the two fairly easily as the job/project requires. If you go from knowing VB and learn only VB.NET then you will be limiting yourself considerably.
There are a number of languages which you can access Cocoa from on OS X but I would hardly consider all of them equal to each other.
Actually, it's a response the story a few days ago on why is it OK to pay the younger devs more than the older ones. Hey Old People, buy this to enhance your VB skills and make more money.
Your entire post is a troll. Not only are you ageist but you seem to think that VB is somehow better than languages like Java, C/C++ or C#.
If you already know C/C++, Java, Objective C or some other variety of C and you want to learn.NET then you are better off learning C#.
VB.NET is a waste of time for anyone except for those who might be charged with porting over some legacy VB code. In a lot of cases, you are probably better off translating parts of that code to pseudo code and rewriting it from scratch in C#.
Unfortunately, that means you don't get H.264 on Linux as its a proprietary codec that requires some form of (paid) licencing.
Sorry but I don't follow. Some enterprising company could develop a H.264 framework and people could pay a small nominal fee to download and install that framework.
I think the GP's point was that H.264 can't be bundled with a free Linux (or browser) download since there's a cost involved. You're right that it can be paid for via a nominal fee that (to quote yourself) "should not be a problem for most people", but surely a completely free base line would be better? That would be good for *all* people.
Actually, I would say that it would not be a problem for anyone. If you can afford a computer, internet access and electrical power
then they can afford to pay a small fee for a codec.
One requires money to be expended by the end user while the other requires effort of either the developer to bundle the dependency
commercial, closed-source software requires a developer to expend effort too you know. Google can easily release an open source product as easily as Microsoft can release a closed source one. The effort's the same.
Thank you for stating the obvious concerning development of actual software but my point was that commercial software generally is marketed to end users more effectively than open source software. Too often, end users are left confused and/or frustrated trying to get software to work because of dependency hell and a lack of proper documentation. It is in the best interest of a commercial developer to make their software not only as available as possible but easy to install and use because end users are where they get their money from.
Paying a nominal fee for universal support in Linux should not be problem for most people.
Its not about cash, think about the problem of putting (free) Nvidia or ATI graphics drivers into Linux and you'll see the true problem.
Besides, its all solved by having WebM!
What is the problem for the end user or any application developer? None. Having a paid versus open source dependency is no different. One requires money to be expended by the end user while the other requires effort of either the developer to bundle the dependency or require the end user to hunt the internet for the obscure library source and compile it.
Unfortunately, that means you don't get H.264 on Linux as its a proprietary codec that requires some form of (paid) licencing.
Sorry but I don't follow. Some enterprising company could develop a H.264 framework and people could pay a small nominal fee to download and install that framework.
Is food free? Is electrical power free? Are clothes free? Is transportation free? Paying a nominal fee for universal support in Linux should not be problem for most people.
H.264 is a standard, not a specific code base. You are free to contribute code to any implementation of that standard which accepts code contributions.
Can you use the spec in your own software and publish it with out a large amount of jumping through hoops?
Sure, you just have to pay a license fee. No hoop jumping required.
Really H.264 may have been public but I would not call it open.
Open source software is not necessarily free. In the same way, you are free to implement H264 but you have to pay a license. This is really no different than the requirement of the GPL to publish source code of any changes you make to a GPL'ed codebase. You pay back in the form of source code rather than a fee and that source is a product of your efforts and time (time == money).
WebM is now what I would consider to be open as is Theora and Dirac http://diracvideo.org/.
I would consider WebM to now be open source but that does not necessarily make it an open standard. Where is the specification? Do I have to use the GPL'ed code base in order to implement it or use clean room techniques to reverse engineer a spec.
So no I do not feel that H.254 meets the definition of open as far as development goes. So yes it really is a bit of a reach IMHO.
Well, I don't consider WebM to be open as far as a standard goes and there is no hardware support for it. For end users, WebM is seen as yet another proprietary format that no hardware or commercial software supports.
I can only assume that he did not trust the protections given to American journalists by the American government. If you leak to another nation you have a better chance of your leakings actually getting to the public.
They information was leaked by Assange eventually to the NY Times (an american newspaper). Notice that the NY Times is not being pursued by the US government because they are protected as members of the free press by the "freedom of press".
Many of the supporters of Assange and this leaker seem to have not noticed that this guy basically stole all of the information that he had access to. That to me does not appear to have been motived by a desire to expose wrong doing but rather malice towards the US government and any of its allies.
I believe that this leaker was trying to attack the government for the DADT policy in the military that was in effect at the time. If that is true then he is a truly despicable person for potentially placing other people in danger over such a petty grievance.
He had a job to do but instead he decided to take out his frustration out on his own nation.
Well, if he's an actual country, he has sovereign immunity and can't be sued...
You are so bloody funny. You knew very well that I meant "Australian". The point is that this leaker was leaking this information out of malice which is why he leaked it to a foreign national and he stole as much information as he had access to rather than trying to find specific examples of corrupts and leaking those.
Manning was spying on America for Americans! He felt that the citizens needed to know what was being kept secret from them. The guy was sold a bill of goods about military service, and when he was in the thick of it he realized that he and everyone else had been lied to.
Juilan Assange is an Australia. If he was interested in exposing bad things, why didn't he go directly to a journalist?
There is no limit on the number of iOS devices that an app purchased from the appstore can be installed on. There is a 5 computer limit on how many computers can act as the library syncing source for those devices but those computers can be changed easily by de-authorizing then in iTunes.
The 5 computer limit is irrelevant to this discussion or the GPL covering VLC since we are talking about an iOS version which runs on iOS devices and those devices do not have any limits. You can sync as many iOS devices as you want to each library.
Apple is imposing additional restrictions on all software distributed through the App Store. One of the restrictions is that you are only allowed to install the software on 5 additional devices. Apple has to accept the GPL to be allowed to distribute at all, and thereby they accept that they cannot add additional usage restrictions beyond what is in the GPL. Yet they still do so.
The end user doesn't have to accept the GPL, but Apple does.
If you are going to bother to discuss this with me then please get your facts straight. There is a limit of 5 computers which can act as the syncing source library per account but there is no limit on how many iOS devices can be synced with that library. That's right, the app can be installed and run on an unlimited number of iOS devices. That 5 library computers per iTunes Store list can be changed. You can de-authorize any computer to free up a slot. There is never any need to authorize or de-authorize an iPhone/iPod Touch or iPad because there is no limit.
Again, there is a difference between "rights and freedoms" recognized or granted by a bill of rights or constitution and rights to copy or distribute granted by a license or contract. Freedoms and rights in the context of citizenship are generally immutable whereas rights granted by a license or contract are transitory. They only exist during the lifespan of the contract or license and you never receive "freedoms" from a license. Stop diluting the meaning of the word "freedom" by using it incorrectly. I do no owe Mr. Stallman one iota for my rights and freedoms as an individual.
Software is written to be used by people. The goal of any developer who is releasing their software for free public consumption should be to make it available on as many platforms as possible. If one believes in the philosophy of open source, one should welcome volunteers willing to port to platforms that one does not have expertise in.
Software without users using it is worthless. It has no purpose to exist.
Strict copyright no longer applies when you have multiple contributors.
Yes it does. He can simply ignore the contributions of the others and sue about illegal distribution of his code. The others can respond by removing his code, but that only fixes the problem going forward and does not stop the people who distributed the code without a license from having to pay damages.
Why you may be correct and while he may have a right to his code, his code is pretty much useless without the code of the other contributors. Even though he is the main contributor, he cannot act unilaterally and relicense VLC unilaterally for example.
Regardless, he has gone against the mission statement of VLC which is:
VideoLAN is a project and a non-profit organization, composed of volunteers, developing and promoting free multimedia solutions.
You can be technically right while being wrong and I think Remi exactly that.
rephrased, "It is suddenly Apple's fault that the iDevice user can not install GNU licensed software?". If not Apple's fault, then who.
Are you talking about freedom here or trying to force other people and companies to bend to your will?
It is the fault of the squabbling developers who have different interpretations of what the GPLV2 provides. If you were to read the license literally without interpretation then you would see that it is silent on DRM as it is a license for the "source" and not the binary.
I think then next version of the GPL has to address this app store problem, just like v3 addressed Tivoization, it's a threat to software freedom.
Software is an inanimate thing. It has no right or freedoms. People have rights and freedoms. By confusing this issue, you are opening up the opportunity for corporations (non-persons) lobbying the government to to have their rights trump the rights of individuals.
You think the EU competition law prevents people from enforcing their copyrights? You are severely deluded.
Strict copyright no longer applies when you have multiple contributors. The GPL V2 applies. Remi is free to remove his contributions from the source tree. When you have one contributor disagreeing with other contributors then it is not just a simple case of "copyright" unless if all copyrights are assigned to Remi which I doubt very much.
There is no mention of DRM or packaging of binaries in the GPL. There is nothing preventing distribution of the binary in a password protected ZIP file in Version 2 of the GPL. It is a source license and dictate what the responsibilities are with regard to the source code if a binary is released.
The current appstore agreement has been deemed to be compatible with the GPLV2 by other developers.
If Remi wants to be difficult then he should convince the VLC team to relicense under the more restrictive GPLV3, remove his code from the repository or shut the hell up.
Nothing other than the dev filing the complaint works for Nokia. This is anticompetitive behaviour. I would not be surprised if his boss at Nokia bribed him to do it.
sorry, but this is utter nonsense.
Which part is nonsense? The fact that he works for Nokia or or that he made false claims that the appstore is incompatible with GPLV2 or that other GPLV2 apps exist on the store after the terms of the store where modified to allow the developer to satisfy the terms of the license. The GPL is a source license and it applies to the use and distribution of the source to any interested party after a binary is distributed from modified source code. It does not apply to the end user as it is not a EULA and it does not specify anything about packaging, advertising or DRM (a form of packaging) of the binary. It only refers to the source code. It is not a binary license.
If they are against DRM then they should upgrade to Version 3.
Why is it that only the Nokia employee objected to the iOS VLC app?
So you're saying that he shouldn't have picked the GPL as a license. The 80's called, they want their flame wars back.
Go read the GPLV2. I dare you to actually read what is says, not what you think it says. There are other GPLV2 programs on the appstore which were initially removed but added back in at the request of the authors after Apple modified the terms of the appstore. Nothing in the Appstore agreement prevents you from fulling the terms and conditions of the GPL as it is a "source" license. It is not an EULA.
The point is to just Say No to vendor lock-in; to the benefit of users and small software firms around the world. It's rather noble of him to take this stand despite the unfair vilification he gets for it, don't you think?
His actions cause vendor lockin. If a person wants VLC on their phone, they will have to buy an android phone and many Android phones are sold with carrier software lockin where you have crapware that you cannot remove without rooting the phone.
The GPL is not about zero-cost distribution, the GPL is about the right for downstream users to modify the program. Apple very intentionally disables this; their app-store is the very antithesis of free software: a world in which you cannot run any program without Apple's stamp of approval.
The GPL is about the source code. It is not an EULA. It does not apply to end users but only to interested third parties who can request a copy of the code. There is no mention of DRM in the GPLV2. Please stop inventing new clauses and see clause 6 of the license.
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Reminds me of a Churchill quote....
Young man (seeing Churchill leaving the bathroom without washing his hands): At Eton they taught us to wash our hands after using the toilet.
Churchill: At Harrow they taught us not to piss on our hands.
It is not the urine that is a concern but rather the bacteria on your junk which gets transferred to your hands. I assume that you touch your junk when you take a piss and that you walk around wearing cloths. Bacteria tends to grow during the day in the nether regions which is why it is good to take a shower every day and why you should wash your hands after taking a piss.
I'm sorry but you obviously have know knowledge of how .net works. It is syntax agnostic, you can write exactly the same functionality in both syntaxes and both syntaxes access all the same functionality. It doesn't matter what syntax you write in, they both do the same thing and you can program equally badly(or well) in both.
I'm sorry but I do know how .NET works. .NET merely provides a framework/abstraction layer to the underlying OS APIs. There is nothing that you can do in .NET that you could not do outside of it but the framework just makes some things easier to do.
Syntax can be very influential on coding style and code quality.
I see no advantage for non-VB programmer to use VB.NET since everything you can do in VB.NET can be done in C#. I also feel that any advantages of familiarity of syntax that VB.NET brings to VB programmers is outweighed by the potential for bad programming practices being brought over from their VB 6 days. VB is a horrid syntax and needs to die.
Having experience with languages like Java or C# allows you to pick up either language quickly as well as other languages.
In my career, I have moved through the following languages: C/C++, Clipper, Perl, VFP (6-9), C#, Java and Python. In my current project I have code in the following languages: C#, Python and Java. The latter is only used for unit testing rules against a rules engine.
Out of all of those languages that I mentioned, only C/C++ and Clipper were languages that I learned while in school and everything else was picked up on the job. I never found a use for Assembly or COBOL in my career so far.
C# and VB.Net are two different syntaxes for using the same common runtime library. Arguing about whether C# is better or worse than VB.Net is the height of language snobbery. What matters is the .Net library underneath. The only reason to prefer one over the other is because you happen to prefer one syntax over the other.
Sorry but if are going to call yourself a "professional" developer then you should know the syntax of Java and/or C#. Once you know one of those languages then you should be able to move between the two fairly easily as the job/project requires. If you go from knowing VB and learn only VB.NET then you will be limiting yourself considerably.
There are a number of languages which you can access Cocoa from on OS X but I would hardly consider all of them equal to each other.
Actually, it's a response the story a few days ago on why is it OK to pay the younger devs more than the older ones. Hey Old People, buy this to enhance your VB skills and make more money.
Your entire post is a troll. Not only are you ageist but you seem to think that VB is somehow better than languages like Java, C/C++ or C#.
If you already know C/C++, Java, Objective C or some other variety of C and you want to learn .NET then you are better off learning C#.
VB.NET is a waste of time for anyone except for those who might be charged with porting over some legacy VB code. In a lot of cases, you are probably better off translating parts of that code to pseudo code and rewriting it from scratch in C#.
Unfortunately, that means you don't get H.264 on Linux as its a proprietary codec that requires some form of (paid) licencing.
Sorry but I don't follow. Some enterprising company could develop a H.264 framework and people could pay a small nominal fee to download and install that framework.
I think the GP's point was that H.264 can't be bundled with a free Linux (or browser) download since there's a cost involved. You're right that it can be paid for via a nominal fee that (to quote yourself) "should not be a problem for most people", but surely a completely free base line would be better? That would be good for *all* people.
Actually, I would say that it would not be a problem for anyone. If you can afford a computer, internet access and electrical power
then they can afford to pay a small fee for a codec.
One requires money to be expended by the end user while the other requires effort of either the developer to bundle the dependency
commercial, closed-source software requires a developer to expend effort too you know. Google can easily release an open source product as easily as Microsoft can release a closed source one. The effort's the same.
Thank you for stating the obvious concerning development of actual software but my point was that commercial software generally is marketed to end users more effectively than open source software. Too often, end users are left confused and/or frustrated trying to get software to work because of dependency hell and a lack of proper documentation. It is in the best interest of a commercial developer to make their software not only as available as possible but easy to install and use because end users are where they get their money from.
Paying a nominal fee for universal support in Linux should not be problem for most people.
Its not about cash, think about the problem of putting (free) Nvidia or ATI graphics drivers into Linux and you'll see the true problem.
Besides, its all solved by having WebM!
What is the problem for the end user or any application developer? None. Having a paid versus open source dependency is no different. One requires money to be expended by the end user while the other requires effort of either the developer to bundle the dependency or require the end user to hunt the internet for the obscure library source and compile it.
Unfortunately, that means you don't get H.264 on Linux as its a proprietary codec that requires some form of (paid) licencing.
Sorry but I don't follow. Some enterprising company could develop a H.264 framework and people could pay a small nominal fee to download and install that framework.
Is food free? Is electrical power free? Are clothes free? Is transportation free? Paying a nominal fee for universal support in Linux should not be problem for most people.
Really? Can you contribute code to H.264?
H.264 is a standard, not a specific code base. You are free to contribute code to any implementation of that standard which accepts code contributions.
Can you use the spec in your own software and publish it with out a large amount of jumping through hoops?
Sure, you just have to pay a license fee. No hoop jumping required.
Really H.264 may have been public but I would not call it open.
Open source software is not necessarily free. In the same way, you are free to implement H264 but you have to pay a license. This is really no different than the requirement of the GPL to publish source code of any changes you make to a GPL'ed codebase. You pay back in the form of source code rather than a fee and that source is a product of your efforts and time (time == money).
WebM is now what I would consider to be open as is Theora and Dirac http://diracvideo.org/.
I would consider WebM to now be open source but that does not necessarily make it an open standard. Where is the specification? Do I have to use the GPL'ed code base in order to implement it or use clean room techniques to reverse engineer a spec.
So no I do not feel that H.254 meets the definition of open as far as development goes.
So yes it really is a bit of a reach IMHO.
Well, I don't consider WebM to be open as far as a standard goes and there is no hardware support for it. For end users, WebM is seen as yet another proprietary format that no hardware or commercial software supports.
Very Blue Man Group. Check out Blue Man Group TV Heads on Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kaixXrzu2qY
I saw their act at the Venetian in Vegas last spring. It was really fun to see live.
I can only assume that he did not trust the protections given to American journalists by the American government. If you leak to another nation you have a better chance of your leakings actually getting to the public.
They information was leaked by Assange eventually to the NY Times (an american newspaper). Notice that the NY Times is not being pursued by the US government because they are protected as members of the free press by the "freedom of press".
Many of the supporters of Assange and this leaker seem to have not noticed that this guy basically stole all of the information that he had access to. That to me does not appear to have been motived by a desire to expose wrong doing but rather malice towards the US government and any of its allies.
I believe that this leaker was trying to attack the government for the DADT policy in the military that was in effect at the time. If that is true then he is a truly despicable person for potentially placing other people in danger over such a petty grievance.
He had a job to do but instead he decided to take out his frustration out on his own nation.
Juilan Assange is an Australia.
Well, if he's an actual country, he has sovereign immunity and can't be sued...
You are so bloody funny. You knew very well that I meant "Australian". The point is that this leaker was leaking this information out of malice which is why he leaked it to a foreign national and he stole as much information as he had access to rather than trying to find specific examples of corrupts and leaking those.
Manning was spying on America for Americans! He felt that the citizens needed to know what was being kept secret from them. The guy was sold a bill of goods about military service, and when he was in the thick of it he realized that he and everyone else had been lied to.
Juilan Assange is an Australia. If he was interested in exposing bad things, why didn't he go directly to a journalist?
There is no limit on the number of iOS devices that an app purchased from the appstore can be installed on. There is a 5 computer limit on how many computers can act as the library syncing source for those devices but those computers can be changed easily by de-authorizing then in iTunes.
The 5 computer limit is irrelevant to this discussion or the GPL covering VLC since we are talking about an iOS version which runs on iOS devices and those devices do not have any limits. You can sync as many iOS devices as you want to each library.
Apple is imposing additional restrictions on all software distributed through the App Store. One of the restrictions is that you are only allowed to install the software on 5 additional devices. Apple has to accept the GPL to be allowed to distribute at all, and thereby they accept that they cannot add additional usage restrictions beyond what is in the GPL. Yet they still do so.
The end user doesn't have to accept the GPL, but Apple does.
If you are going to bother to discuss this with me then please get your facts straight. There is a limit of 5 computers which can act as the syncing source library per account but there is no limit on how many iOS devices can be synced with that library. That's right, the app can be installed and run on an unlimited number of iOS devices. That 5 library computers per iTunes Store list can be changed. You can de-authorize any computer to free up a slot. There is never any need to authorize or de-authorize an iPhone/iPod Touch or iPad because there is no limit.
Stop spreading FUD and outright lies.
Again, there is a difference between "rights and freedoms" recognized or granted by a bill of rights or constitution and rights to copy or distribute granted by a license or contract. Freedoms and rights in the context of citizenship are generally immutable whereas rights granted by a license or contract are transitory. They only exist during the lifespan of the contract or license and you never receive "freedoms" from a license. Stop diluting the meaning of the word "freedom" by using it incorrectly. I do no owe Mr. Stallman one iota for my rights and freedoms as an individual.
Software is written to be used by people. The goal of any developer who is releasing their software for free public consumption should be to make it available on as many platforms as possible. If one believes in the philosophy of open source, one should welcome volunteers willing to port to platforms that one does not have expertise in.
Software without users using it is worthless. It has no purpose to exist.
Strict copyright no longer applies when you have multiple contributors.
Yes it does. He can simply ignore the contributions of the others and sue about illegal distribution of his code. The others can respond by removing his code, but that only fixes the problem going forward and does not stop the people who distributed the code without a license from having to pay damages.
Why you may be correct and while he may have a right to his code, his code is pretty much useless without the code of the other contributors. Even though he is the main contributor, he cannot act unilaterally and relicense VLC unilaterally for example.
Regardless, he has gone against the mission statement of VLC which is:
VideoLAN is a project and a non-profit organization, composed of volunteers, developing and promoting free multimedia solutions.
You can be technically right while being wrong and I think Remi exactly that.
rephrased, "It is suddenly Apple's fault that the iDevice user can not install GNU licensed software?". If not Apple's fault, then who.
Are you talking about freedom here or trying to force other people and companies to bend to your will?
It is the fault of the squabbling developers who have different interpretations of what the GPLV2 provides. If you were to read the license literally without interpretation then you would see that it is silent on DRM as it is a license for the "source" and not the binary.
I think then next version of the GPL has to address this app store problem, just like v3 addressed Tivoization, it's a threat to software freedom.
Software is an inanimate thing. It has no right or freedoms. People have rights and freedoms. By confusing this issue, you are opening up the opportunity for corporations (non-persons) lobbying the government to to have their rights trump the rights of individuals.
Stop anthropomorphizing software, it hates that.
You think the EU competition law prevents people from enforcing their copyrights? You are severely deluded.
Strict copyright no longer applies when you have multiple contributors. The GPL V2 applies. Remi is free to remove his contributions from the source tree. When you have one contributor disagreeing with other contributors then it is not just a simple case of "copyright" unless if all copyrights are assigned to Remi which I doubt very much.
There is no mention of DRM or packaging of binaries in the GPL. There is nothing preventing distribution of the binary in a password protected ZIP file in Version 2 of the GPL. It is a source license and dictate what the responsibilities are with regard to the source code if a binary is released.
The current appstore agreement has been deemed to be compatible with the GPLV2 by other developers.
If Remi wants to be difficult then he should convince the VLC team to relicense under the more restrictive GPLV3, remove his code from the repository or shut the hell up.
Nothing other than the dev filing the complaint works for Nokia. This is anticompetitive behaviour. I would not be surprised if his boss at Nokia bribed him to do it.
sorry, but this is utter nonsense.
Which part is nonsense? The fact that he works for Nokia or or that he made false claims that the appstore is incompatible with GPLV2 or that other GPLV2 apps exist on the store after the terms of the store where modified to allow the developer to satisfy the terms of the license. The GPL is a source license and it applies to the use and distribution of the source to any interested party after a binary is distributed from modified source code. It does not apply to the end user as it is not a EULA and it does not specify anything about packaging, advertising or DRM (a form of packaging) of the binary. It only refers to the source code. It is not a binary license.
If they are against DRM then they should upgrade to Version 3.
Why is it that only the Nokia employee objected to the iOS VLC app?
So you're saying that he shouldn't have picked the GPL as a license. The 80's called, they want their flame wars back.
Go read the GPLV2. I dare you to actually read what is says, not what you think it says. There are other GPLV2 programs on the appstore which were initially removed but added back in at the request of the authors after Apple modified the terms of the appstore. Nothing in the Appstore agreement prevents you from fulling the terms and conditions of the GPL as it is a "source" license. It is not an EULA.
The point is to just Say No to vendor lock-in; to the benefit of users and small software firms around the world. It's rather noble of him to take this stand despite the unfair vilification he gets for it, don't you think?
His actions cause vendor lockin. If a person wants VLC on their phone, they will have to buy an android phone and many Android phones are sold with carrier software lockin where you have crapware that you cannot remove without rooting the phone.
The GPL is not about zero-cost distribution, the GPL is about the right for downstream users to modify the program. Apple very intentionally disables this; their app-store is the very antithesis of free software: a world in which you cannot run any program without Apple's stamp of approval.
The GPL is about the source code. It is not an EULA. It does not apply to end users but only to interested third parties who can request a copy of the code. There is no mention of DRM in the GPLV2. Please stop inventing new clauses and see clause 6 of the license.