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Plagiarism of my open source app ChatSecure

chatsecure.org

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Re: Plagiarism of my open source app ChatSecure

#31

Post by bermanoid »

chrisballinger wrote: post #26
ZoFreX wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As p4bl0 pointed out though, if your license isn't being violated then you have no claim here, they're obeying the law and your takedowns are not valid.

They are relicensing my software: Regular License - $13.99 The regular license allows the use of the purchased item in a project for either personal or commercial uses, without the payment of any further fees or charges after the initial download cost. The regular license gives you the right to use the purchased items within 1 project of your own or on behalf of a client (commercial, personal, or non-profit). You or…

And what part of that is incompatible with a BSD license?

Re: Plagiarism of my open source app ChatSecure

#32

Post by icebraining »

calciphus wrote: post #3

Seems like a pretty reasonable response to me. More importantly, I wonder how frequently this happens - pulling down an open-source project and trying to sell it elsewhere?

There's nothing illegal about doing that. Only the relicensing is iffy.

Re: Plagiarism of my open source app ChatSecure

#33

Post by batgaijin »

chrisballinger wrote: post #15
p4bl0 wrote: post #12

If you didn't download it, how do you know (s)he removed mentions of your name, and the BSD license mention? Because if those things are still there, what (s)he is doing is perfectly legal and fine. I see two things that you could do (in addition to the DMCA if the BSD license was actually not respected): - Selling it yourself cheaper than (s)he is (since anyway you weren't counting on making any money with it) with…

I shouldn't have to pay money to find out if my license is being violated. Honestly, I don't even care that they are selling the code, I just care that they are representing my work as their own.

That's what happens with BSD code man. Do you know how much BSD code is in OS X and Windows and commercial software in general?

Releasing BSD code quickly turns into repackaging of the code by people who are more interested in money than coding. Next time do research on the licenses that are available before you pick one. I recommend the GPL, despite the FUD about how you can make a 'livelihood' off of it, which I somehow find easier to imagine than you being happy with this person piggybacking.

Re: Plagiarism of my open source app ChatSecure

#34

Post by jasonkester »

I think you're missing an important lesson here: Your product is more valuable than you think.

This guy wouldn't have started selling your thing is it wasn't clear that it's something that people will pay for. Your first reaction when you hear that he's making money off of it shouldn't be how to stop him. It should be "Wow. I could be making money off of this.

My advice:

  - Don't worry about this guy.
  - Put a price on your product
  - Stop giving away the source
  - Improve it until your "competitor" fades away
There's no rule saying that you have to give your work away as open source. And as you've demonstrated, there's also no rule that if you give your work away for free, somebody else won't notice its value and sell it in your place.

Re: Plagiarism of my open source app ChatSecure

#35

Post by legulere »

chrisballinger wrote: post #2

Hey, author of ChatSecure here. Has anyone else experienced plagiarism of their open source software? This guy was almost insultingly lazy and didn't even bother to use a different logo or obfuscate the code.

Maybe you can get him for using the same logo, which you hopefully didn't set under bsd license

Re: Plagiarism of my open source app ChatSecure

#36

Post by icebraining »

jancborchardt wrote: post #28
PeterisP wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The whole point of a BSD licence is that I am allowed to redistribute it (with my changes optional) under more restrictive or closed source terms. This is what you explicitly allowed him to do by offering that licence. If you want copies and derivatives to remain open source always, then use GPL - which adds a list of restrictions for redistribution.

Still, it needs to retain the copyright notice and credit the original author. What the plagiarist in this case did is use it as if it was Public Domain.

What makes you say he didn't? Have you downloaded the app? Because OP says he hasn't, so he can't possibly know.

BSD doesn't force you to put the copyright notice and credit in the app description page.

Re: Plagiarism of my open source app ChatSecure

#37

Post by fdr »

jancborchardt wrote: post #28
PeterisP wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The whole point of a BSD licence is that I am allowed to redistribute it (with my changes optional) under more restrictive or closed source terms. This is what you explicitly allowed him to do by offering that licence. If you want copies and derivatives to remain open source always, then use GPL - which adds a list of restrictions for redistribution.

Still, it needs to retain the copyright notice and credit the original author. What the plagiarist in this case did is use it as if it was Public Domain.

Given the audience that'd buy this software, I doubt that just dropping in a LICENSE file -- which is all that is needed -- will materially impact this borderline scam. Unlike the 4-clause BSD, which was not tractable, the modern 3-clause I'm quite sure the author used does not say in any way "must display this copyright in the most obvious place." If the repackager simply includes the file, I believe he will meet BSD provisions, per the letter of the contract. I see two ways to look at this:

* If one really doesn't like things like this to be within the grounds of the copyright, don't use BSD. Use GPL.

* On the other hand, what odds are there that the GPL will be reliably enforced against such small fry actors? Maybe you are best choosing a license based on what makes the most sense for the project's advancement anyway.

Re: Plagiarism of my open source app ChatSecure

#38

Post by zcvosdfdgj »

chrisballinger wrote: post #26
ZoFreX wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As p4bl0 pointed out though, if your license isn't being violated then you have no claim here, they're obeying the law and your takedowns are not valid.

They are relicensing my software: Regular License - $13.99 The regular license allows the use of the purchased item in a project for either personal or commercial uses, without the payment of any further fees or charges after the initial download cost. The regular license gives you the right to use the purchased items within 1 project of your own or on behalf of a client (commercial, personal, or non-profit). You or…

Nothing you just posted is in violation of the license. Do I really need to give you a link to the license you're using? The BSDL only has two conditions:

Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.

Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.

Re: Plagiarism of my open source app ChatSecure

#39

Post by shared4you »

What your "plagiarist" is doing is perfectly legal I think. As long as your name appears in the source code and/or binary, you can't send a DMCA takedown. Also, he is not using your name to endorse his own product, which is what point 3 of the BSD license is all about.

Also, note that the plagiarist's derivative software can be under any license of his choice, be it commercial, non-commercial or personal. He is free to include / modify your source code and sell it under a different license of his choice -- the only restriction being that your name must appear in those parts of his source code you have written. Unless you buy his product and confirm that he has removed your name, you can't do anything.

Remember that BSD license roughly means public domain with copyright notice preservation. That's all. It doesn't restrict anything else.

Re: Plagiarism of my open source app ChatSecure

#40

Post by chrisballinger »

jasonkester wrote: post #34

I think you're missing an important lesson here: Your product is more valuable than you think. This guy wouldn't have started selling your thing is it wasn't clear that it's something that people will pay for. Your first reaction when you hear that he's making money off of it shouldn't be how to stop him. It should be "Wow. I could be making money off of this. My advice: - Don't worry about this guy. - Put a price on…

Would you trust proprietary software to encrypt your communications?
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