Can it be identified only in a PR or is there any tool that can search through all forks?
Maybe it’s too small problem to solve though.
Microsoft forked MIT licensed repo and changed the copyright [fixed]
151–160 of 626 posts
Re: Microsoft forked MIT licensed repo and changed the copyright [fixed]
#152Earlier quoted context omitted.
Things get philosophical rather quickly I'm afraid. If I misconfigure an FTP server, and you download some MIT code that I stripped the copyrights from, does that count as redistribution?
I would say that it isnt, because you had no intent to redistribute it. But you cant make that argument here, as its a public repo, as such Microsoft did have the intent to redistribute.
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Re: Microsoft forked MIT licensed repo and changed the copyright [fixed]
#153Earlier quoted context omitted.
so take them to court.
A supercorp will have far more resources to succeed in courts than an individual person, such that the courts are not a fair avenue for resolving disputes. The court of public opinion is, unfortunately, far more accessible to the individual.
That being said, if someone were to sue Microsoft over this (they would have to be the original copyright holder), I think it's more likely Microsoft would try and settle out of court.
Re: Microsoft forked MIT licensed repo and changed the copyright [fixed]
#154I don't think that just because some "bot" did this Microsoft is to be excused. Someone decided that using a piece of software to automatically alter license files. This is a genuinely stupid idea. And they already fucked up in the same way with the CUPS project. Will they learn without someone taking them to court over this? I don't think so.
Re: Microsoft forked MIT licensed repo and changed the copyright [fixed]
#155Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is very obviously a mistake and I don’t know how can anyone assume otherwise.
Because “Microsoft Bad”. When a company gets big enough, there will always be a portion of the population you can never please, and Microsoft reached that size a long time ago.
It's got nothing to do with their size but the 40 years (thus far) of doing aggressively bad shit.
Re: Microsoft forked MIT licensed repo and changed the copyright [fixed]
#156How did it used to go?
Embrace, Extend, and Extinguish
But now not even bothering with the extend. I’d guess this is a mistake of some kind.
Re: Microsoft forked MIT licensed repo and changed the copyright [fixed]
#157The larger issue is that anyone using GitHub is donating their work for re-use without attribution through Copilot. In return, you receive hosting from GitHub. The writing is on the wall. You MUST host your own code on a stand-alone website. Here is an example. This Go program (a compiler) generates and serves its own website: https://NN-512.com It runs on a Linode shared CPU cloud instance that costs $5 per month: h…
The following is pure conjecture with zero evidence:
I think that’s on purpose, not to “steal” code from GPL’ed softwares’ authors, but to get GPL’ed code into commercial projects. Then Microsoft can say “oops, we were right all along! The GPL is so dangerously viral that you can’t even host your software on the same server!”
I know that sounds stupid, unless you were there for the Halloween Documents. After all these years, it seems to me that Microsoft hasn’t done the 180 they portray.
Re: Microsoft forked MIT licensed repo and changed the copyright [fixed]
#158Earlier quoted context omitted.
Any work, no matter how trivial, is eligible for copyright as long as it is an original artifact with a distinct identity.
Copyright laws vary wildly across countries and jurisdictions
...but aside from Eritrea, Ethiopia, Iran, Iraq, Marshall Islands, Nauru, Palau, Somalia, and South Sudan everyone is part of one or more (usually more) international treaties that cover copyright such as the Berne Convention or TRIPS or UCC, so you should expect in most places that most people on HN are likely to ever deal with have copyright law that isn't too different for the most common situations.
Re: Microsoft forked MIT licensed repo and changed the copyright [fixed]
#159Earlier quoted context omitted.
A 'mistake' they are actually doing since a long time now. Here is the cups equivalent with a license change from apache to mit for the CUPS system. https://github.com/microsoft/cups/commit/ad69bcc78bdea3fea3f...
Why the scare quotes around mistake? Are you implying that it's intentional? Or negligence? It seems like nobody noticed the CUPS license change until now, so it's irrelevant, right?
How is it not intentional? To me it seems very clear that someone designed this bot to specifically alter the LICENSE file so that it matches some sort of predefind Microsoft file.
Edit: To give a bit more nuance, I would guess that the actual bot changing the LICENSE files is not a mistake, but working as intended. What could, however, be a mistake is thinking that licenses can be legally overwritten. It wouldn't be a "rogue engineer" kind of mistake. Certainly several people at Microsoft have signed off on this.
Re: Microsoft forked MIT licensed repo and changed the copyright [fixed]
#160Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is very obviously a mistake and I don’t know how can anyone assume otherwise.
Because “Microsoft Bad”. When a company gets big enough, there will always be a portion of the population you can never please, and Microsoft reached that size a long time ago.
Microsoft has a long and dark history. I think you’re brushing aside the real contention.
People who were around before MS decided to open-source-wash their brand KNOW what Microsoft’s DNA is. They had a literal playbook to crush Linux.