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Trump’s new social media platform found using Mastodon code

blog.joinmastodon.org

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Re: Trump’s new social media platform found using Mastodon code

#11

Post by lynndotpy »

rogual wrote: post #10

Do we really have to give this guy the #1 Hacker News story? He was fading into the background so nicely.

This is interesting to me because it's both a high-profile violation of AGPL, and because it's (for better or for worse) a high-profile usage of Mastodon in the wild.

Re: Trump’s new social media platform found using Mastodon code

#12

Post by deepsun »

usui wrote: post #4

Does a history of enforcement help in cases like this? The article itself says that Truth Social is "antithetical" to Mastodon's values, but that there's nothing they can do about the usage of their software other than license violations. It sounds like they have a bias to enforce their license in this case. If Mastodon has a weak history of enforcing their license to other organizations, does it weaken the case? I'm…

If they had noted a legal enforcement, it would have sounded like threatening. They did the right thing and just noted the problem for now. Maybe the other party will fix the infringement and close the issue.

Re: Trump’s new social media platform found using Mastodon code

#13

Post by FemmeAndroid »

usui wrote: post #4

Does a history of enforcement help in cases like this? The article itself says that Truth Social is "antithetical" to Mastodon's values, but that there's nothing they can do about the usage of their software other than license violations. It sounds like they have a bias to enforce their license in this case. If Mastodon has a weak history of enforcing their license to other organizations, does it weaken the case? I'm…

No, unlike trademark law, copyright law does not require consistent enforcement to maintain. (Copyright law is the basis of the license.)

Also, stating a bias does not imply selective enforcement. I don’t think there are many examples of mastodon instances breaching the terms of the license, and certainly not at this scale.

Re: Trump’s new social media platform found using Mastodon code

#14

Post by h2odragon »

This (possible but technically not yet a) license violation has gotten more press for OSS licenses and enforcement than anything before, I think.

Certainly more press than the Vizio thing, which will actually impact a lot more people if anything comes of it.

Re: Trump’s new social media platform found using Mastodon code

#15

Post by cedilla »

usui wrote: post #4

Does a history of enforcement help in cases like this? The article itself says that Truth Social is "antithetical" to Mastodon's values, but that there's nothing they can do about the usage of their software other than license violations. It sounds like they have a bias to enforce their license in this case. If Mastodon has a weak history of enforcing their license to other organizations, does it weaken the case? I'm…

In general, you don't have any obligation to enforce your rights.

There is the well-known exception of trademark law, but that's in the nature of the matter. If PepsiCo sells Coca-Cola and the Coca-Cola company doesn't react, then the trade mark obviously doesn't allow customers to identify genuine Coca-Cola.

Re: Trump’s new social media platform found using Mastodon code

#16

Post by pibechorro »

rogual wrote: post #10

Do we really have to give this guy the #1 Hacker News story? He was fading into the background so nicely.

You mean the person who was the sitting president of the united states, who got deplatformed in unison by big tech social media, and is now fighting against censorship by using tech? Yeah, that is not relevant at all to hackernews /s

Re: Trump’s new social media platform found using Mastodon code

#17

Post by h2odragon »

lynndotpy wrote: post #11
rogual wrote: post #10

Do we really have to give this guy the #1 Hacker News story? He was fading into the background so nicely.

This is interesting to me because it's both a high-profile violation of AGPL, and because it's (for better or for worse) a high-profile usage of Mastodon in the wild.

Gab was pretty high profile too, no?

Re: Trump’s new social media platform found using Mastodon code

#19

Post by FemmeAndroid »

chrismeller wrote: post #5

Seems like the terms they quoted are boilerplate. I wouldn’t attribute this to malice.

Despite them being boilerplate, they come along with the removal of the existing license text. Still, I’ll reserve final judgement until 30 days pass or this letter is acknowledged.
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