Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Winamp deletes entire GitHub source code repo after a rocky few weeks

arstechnica.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 371 posts

Re: Winamp deletes entire GitHub source code repo after a rocky few weeks

#21

Post by lukeschlather »

belthesar wrote: post #14
sureIy wrote: post #10

I don't really understand why people complained. The source is open, if don't want to contribute, don't. Just because something doesn't fit a specific definition it doesn't mean it's not worth of existence.

The source wasn't open though, it was available, and it was provided in a sense that fully showcased that they did not understand what they were doing. Everything from licenses that were fully unenforceable and non-compliant with Github's license agreement to illegally distributing proprietary code to fundamentally misunderstanding how to use git. It's one thing to provide a source available codebase. That's a choice…

Describing this as "comically awful" seems strange. In terms of building a good open source project, they did a bad job. However they did a good job making the source available. Also given all the dependencies they may have (whether intentionally or not) followed the best path to make sure that the source would be useful. They ended up looking bad and exposing themselves to legal trouble, but I'm not sure this was awful, and they might even have known exactly what they were doing.

Re: Winamp deletes entire GitHub source code repo after a rocky few weeks

#22

Post by sph »

VonGuard wrote: post #11

This is a cautionary tale for preservationists. My current preservation project is still not open because we are very slowly reviewing the code to make sure we don't accidentally include any IP when we open the source code. The real things that get you are similar to what happened here: codecs, graphics libraries, and a really big one to look out for is fonts. It'd be great if there was a scanner that could detect th…

Unpopular opinion: preservationism shouldn't care about licensing and legal nonsense.

Because what is the point if something is distributed in a restrictive license, can't be preserved and then gets lost to time? Also, licensing is to avoid distribution, modification or outright copying by competitors; preservation is completely orthogonal to those concerns. It is to avoid losing a piece of craft to the sands of time. There is no reason laws should have power over anything in perpetuity.

As seen in other spaces, pirates ignoring the "law" will provide the greatest service to humanity.

Re: Winamp deletes entire GitHub source code repo after a rocky few weeks

#23

Post by Loudergood »

londons_explore wrote: post #20
VonGuard wrote: post #11

This is a cautionary tale for preservationists. My current preservation project is still not open because we are very slowly reviewing the code to make sure we don't accidentally include any IP when we open the source code. The real things that get you are similar to what happened here: codecs, graphics libraries, and a really big one to look out for is fonts. It'd be great if there was a scanner that could detect th…

The thing is, the vast majority of graphics libraries from 1992 the IP owner no longer cares about , and the code usually has nearly zero commercial value . I wish more were brave enough to just publish it with an open license, and then if the owner complains you take it down and rewrite. Any damages for distributing 30 year old source code are hopefully in the single-digit-dollars range anyway.

The problem is you'll get crushed by legal fees in the meantime.

Re: Winamp deletes entire GitHub source code repo after a rocky few weeks

#25

Post by VonGuard »

londons_explore wrote: post #20
VonGuard wrote: post #11

This is a cautionary tale for preservationists. My current preservation project is still not open because we are very slowly reviewing the code to make sure we don't accidentally include any IP when we open the source code. The real things that get you are similar to what happened here: codecs, graphics libraries, and a really big one to look out for is fonts. It'd be great if there was a scanner that could detect th…

The thing is, the vast majority of graphics libraries from 1992 the IP owner no longer cares about , and the code usually has nearly zero commercial value . I wish more were brave enough to just publish it with an open license, and then if the owner complains you take it down and rewrite. Any damages for distributing 30 year old source code are hopefully in the single-digit-dollars range anyway.

Completely incorrect. This work is being done under a non-profit, and whether or not the original owners care is irrelevant. Doing this would immediately open the non-profit to litigation and endanger the entire project. Just because we don't think anyone cares doesn't mean we won't get sued.

This project is preserving the source code around a distributed chat system from the year 2000, the E programming language, and the first real usage of JSON. Outside of those aspects, it's not about preserving fonts and proprietary code.

You are literally suggesting that we take proprietary, copyrighted code and release it under an open source license with no standing, rights, or ownership. It's insane to even suggest this. If you put the source code for Windows 95 online, you'd be sued into a pile of ashes by MS within 10 minutes.

When we want to open source proprietary code, we work with the rights holders. This code was all given to us under such an agreement, and the agreement ONLY covers the code owned by the people who built this thing. The deal was contingent on us not opening any of the code the original owners didn't own, as that would ALSO incur risk for them.

Re: Winamp deletes entire GitHub source code repo after a rocky few weeks

#27

Post by londons_explore »

Loudergood wrote: post #23
londons_explore wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thing is, the vast majority of graphics libraries from 1992 the IP owner no longer cares about , and the code usually has nearly zero commercial value . I wish more were brave enough to just publish it with an open license, and then if the owner complains you take it down and rewrite. Any damages for distributing 30 year old source code are hopefully in the single-digit-dollars range anyway.

The problem is you'll get crushed by legal fees in the meantime.

but if courts gave out damages of $10 for this sort of offence (taking into account the very low commercial value of the IP stolen), then very few people would even bother pursuing it in court.

Re: Winamp deletes entire GitHub source code repo after a rocky few weeks

#29

Post by VonGuard »

londons_explore wrote: post #27
Loudergood wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is you'll get crushed by legal fees in the meantime.

but if courts gave out damages of $10 for this sort of offence (taking into account the very low commercial value of the IP stolen), then very few people would even bother pursuing it in court.

Courts do not do that. The people suing would offer up a big old list of damages into the millions and then negotiate down from there to something like 6 figures AND the loser covering the court costs. The American legal system is completely broken, and amounts to two people piling up money, then the one with the bigger stack wins both stacks of money. This is completely untenable for a non-profit to even think about, let alone to incur the risk.

Re: Winamp deletes entire GitHub source code repo after a rocky few weeks

#30

Post by dang »

fsflover wrote: post #17

Related: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41662105 Winamp contained modified GPL code, violating the GPL (github.com/winampdesktop) 18 points by mepian 19 days ago | 6 comments

Thanks! Macroexpanded:

Winamp contained modified GPL code, violating the GPL - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41662105 - Sept 2024 (6 comments)

Winamp removed "No forking" restriction from license - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41650355 - Sept 2024 (12 comments)

Winamp Legacy player source code - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41636804 - Sept 2024 (328 comments)

Post reply on HN