Live data from Hacker News

Bye bye BetterSlack

g3rv4.com

61–70 of 392 posts

Re: Bye bye BetterSlack

#61

I think you can safely ignore this cease and desist. Just change the name and add a disclaimer so your users know that by using your extension they are violating their acceptable use policy. This is no different than any user writing a Tampermonkey script to modify any website they want to modify. Even further, this is no different than a user opening the Dev Tools console and modifying things there.

He should talk to a lawyer, especially if he accepted a binding agreement by using Slack that forbids any of the research he did to figure out how to get his integrations to work.

Re: Bye bye BetterSlack

#63
post #30

I understand the naming issue but from the look of it the extension only works locally, where's the issue with that?

they don't want people injecting javascript on their website. That's all there's to it. I'm not sending anything anywhere. I'm not storing anything. I'm not profiting from it.

Don't think they can enforce this at all, I would just change the name and call it a day. The burden is on you though, certainly no one can force you to make decisions. :)

Re: Bye bye BetterSlack

#64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would like to. What is a good video conference solution? To replace zoom (which works great for us so far) for example. Thanks.

I like Jitsi. Zero setup, just push go and share the link: https://meet.jit.si/ Open source software based on standardized browser technologies.

Thank you.

I believe stride's video conference was based on it too, we tried it and wasn't that good. But I will try it separately too.

Re: Bye bye BetterSlack

#65
post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I worked at Cisco, who had their own awful IM client. Our team used Hangouts instead with great success. Company-wide conferences were a ball-ache. The corporate solution didn't mute by default, so with 40000 people in a conf it devolved into a "TURN YOUR MIC OFF" shouting match for the first 10 minutes.

The more frightening thing is that Cisco (presumably as developer of the client?) couldn't change the defaults to solve one of their own problems.

Can't remember, it was a while ago. I will say that anybody who knows what Blizzard is will know how bad their IM was.

Re: Bye bye BetterSlack

#66
post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this was a bunch of Tampermonkey scripts... but I don't want to ignore their cease and desist. I... just don't do it. changing the name is not an issue... however, if I have to take it down, that's moot.

"I... just don't do it." You mean you do not ignore cease and desist orders by principal? Why? There should be at least some criteria by which you judge which ones you can ignore and which you can't? What if they told you to cease and desist programming forever on any project because they state in their terms that once you mess with their UI with JavaScript you are not allowed to program anymore? Ridiculous right? So…

Because... I have lots of things to work on, lots of things I want to build, lots of people I want to talk with.

None of them involve talking with a lawyer in a different country over something that's really not that important in my life.

Re: Bye bye BetterSlack

#67
post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The problem the company had was a split in comms networks. My new team is going through this. For comms, my machine came equipped with Skype for Business, Slack, Stride and Bria. It's a fun game rolling the dice when you need to ask someone a question figuring out which comms tool that person uses. A game I've avoided playing altogether by just sending an email.

I thought chat was going to eliminate the need for email. ;-)

So say we all, so say we all.

Re: Bye bye BetterSlack

#68
post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are two problems with this approach: 1. I don't want to get involved in that, even if I'm based in Uruguay and they'd have a hard time suing me. 2. What they could do is put resources to detect the extension and block it. We could start a mouse and cat game that they'd win... I don't have their resources to invest in it. After all, all I wanted was to solve Slack for me, and that would make it harder.

Could they really sue you for creating a chrome extension that modifies their webpage? That would be a very dark day for the internet. I can't imagine there's any legal basis for that, but it would be very interesting to hear a lawyer's opinion. Well done on what you have achieved, keep fighting the good fight!

I don't know and I also don't want to figure it out :)

Re: Bye bye BetterSlack

#69
post #33
post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> My company of 500 with only 30 devs uses it. Same at my workplace. Slack is mostly used by the managers, all the devs avoid it. Even if you don't mind the proprietory protocol, the performance even on beefy machines is an absolute dumpster fire, that nobody wants to touch the app with a ten foot pole.

Its the opposite at my workplace. Mostly the developers use Slack. What do your devs use instead?

We use bonfire, which is the same tool the community at Stack Overflow uses to interact.

Re: Bye bye BetterSlack

#70
post #50
post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this was a bunch of Tampermonkey scripts... but I don't want to ignore their cease and desist. I... just don't do it. changing the name is not an issue... however, if I have to take it down, that's moot.

It's our right as developers to modify and upgrade the tools we use. It's important to ensure that this remains true both today and in the future. I wanted to give you a moral boost, in case you were looking for a reason to take a stand. But if you don't want to, that's entirely valid.

Ok Stallman, now back to reality where people do own software, they do have legal restrictions on its use, and it's not a human right to circumvent it.
Post reply on HN