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Microsoft acquires Github

blogs.microsoft.com

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Re: Microsoft acquires Github

#751

Post by walterstucco »

rckclmbr wrote: post #708
xaiki wrote: post #683

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well hello there, I'd like to share a story with you. I'm the maintainer of butterproject.org and have been maintaining popcorntime.io for a while, we had there 2 issues with GitHub a few years ago, both related to (unfounded) copyright claims on the butter and popcorntime code (we absolutely own the right to every single line there), when we tried to make our case we were ignored once and asked to 'keep things quiet…

popcorntime was strictly confrontational, and was blatantly illegal. "Transforming BitTorrent media streaming" can be a good goal, but doing it illegally will cause you to be shut down. Remember grooveshark? They tried the same thing -- to create a legit service that disrupts and industry. But there's a reason they failed and spotify succeeded, and I think it's because they partnered with existing companies instead o…

I'm more inclined to think that Spotify succeeded because it's based in Sweden

Re: Microsoft acquires Github

#752

Post by chuckkir »

pritambaral wrote: post #359
airstrike wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That phrase is from over 20 years ago...

Phrases don't lose their relevance due to age. If they do, they do it because the situation has changed, and similar situations haven't come up. For example, the phrase "doublespeak" is much older and also especially relevant today.

The phrase is still valid, but it is unclear that it applies to the current company. Companies do not have minds and are not people. They do have inertia, but if you change enough of the people then it's fundamentally a different company. MS is certainly different than it was 20 or 10 years ago.

Re: Microsoft acquires Github

#753

Post by 2trill2spill »

cdelsolar wrote: post #746
amelius wrote: post #738

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If the NSA felt like spying on you, pro tip, they're gonna be able to do it. True, but I suppose it matters how easy/difficult it is for them to do that.

The NSA is not god, they can't break 2048-bit TLS encryption no matter how many computers they have.

> The NSA is not god, they can't break 2048-bit TLS encryption no matter how many computers they have.

2048 bit TLS encryption? You mean 2048 bit RSA encryption? Also what source do you have that says the NSA can not crack a 2048 bit RSA key? Last I checked that info was non public and there is no definitive, credible source saying whether they can or can not crack 2048 RSA keys.

Re: Microsoft acquires Github

#754

Post by wtetzner »

pritambaral wrote: post #387
stordoff wrote: post #369

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What exactly is Microsoft alleged to have done wrong here? It starts by saying "stole my code", but then discusses an MIT licensed piece of code. Furthermore, I'd see Microsoft's reply: > I'm not aware of any deliberate copying of the Lerna code, but let me dig into it now and call all the devs on the team to be sure. If there is, we should definitely give correct attribution, so I want to investigate. [...] I checke…

> It starts by saying "stole my code", but then discusses an MIT licensed piece of code Unrelated to the rest of the discussion, I just want to clarify that MIT License != 'Do Whatever You Want' License. MIT requires attribution and maintaining the copyright license on existing code. Yes, if you don't adhere to the license's terms when copying code, it is stealing.

> Yes, if you don't adhere to the license's terms when copying code, it is stealing.

Is it? Or is it copyright infringement?

Re: Microsoft acquires Github

#755

Post by sanbor »

morley wrote: post #735
sanbor wrote: post #685

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't mean that this is going to happen. I wanted to give an example of a potential threat. My idea was to show one of many problems with centralization and relying so much in GitHub and GitHub SSL certs. Maybe we can start signing our commits to increase security giving the potential threat. The same way that after the Snowden revelations we started using more and more HTTPS. We can also think of better ways of s…

> I wanted to give an example of a potential threat. I really don't like this line of thinking. It's the same one used by news organizations to plump up their stories, or by politicians to make an improbable threat seem more real. In both of those cases, I think the long-term effect is to cause the public to think that very rare events are a lot more common. The result is not a culture of wariness but a culture of fe…

In security many things are "potential" threats. Just being unlikely doesn't mean that the threat doesn't exists. For example, a guy found a potential threat in rails[1], and rails developers dismissed his findings as unlikely exploitable. Then the guy go and hacked GitHub to prove that the issue was real[2][3] and that even the best rails developers were vulnerable.

[1] https://github.com/rails/rails/issues/5228

[2] https://github.com/rails/rails/commit/b83965785db1eec019edf1...

[3] https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2012/03/hacke...

Re: Microsoft acquires Github

#757

Post by beezle »

Perhaps I missed in the other comments, but is anyone else here shocked by the price tag? That is an outstanding amount of money to pay for Github, certainly a very large premium.

Re: Microsoft acquires Github

#758

Post by merinowool »

Fnoord wrote: post #648
merinowool wrote: post #594

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They now have access to private projects so can use that to help create exploits to closed source products that are hosted on GitHub or use it to create their own products or patents.

Who has this access. The NSA? They didn't have this access when GitHub was independent? Says who? Backed up by which facts?

Fact is Microsoft is a hostile company and will have access to private repositories.

Re: Microsoft acquires Github

#759

Post by bigmanwalter »

TuringNYC wrote: post #744
bigmanwalter wrote: post #732

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you for saying the Skype ID thing here. I thought I had gone crazy....

Same thing here! I thought I had gone crazy until I started interacting with more more people online that had the same exact problem. Honestly, it became an obsession to figure out for me because I started feeling stupid not being able to figure it out...turns out there was no way out of this corner case! Microsoft bought Skype in May 2011 for $8.5 billion. Think about the magnitude of dysfunction for a post-merger i…

I can hardly imagine what level of dysfunction is possible in an organisation as large as Microsoft. I have only worked in small companies, less than 30 employees, and my mind has already been blown.
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