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

FFmpeg has issued a DMCA takedown on GitHub

twitter.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 200 posts

Re: FFmpeg has issued a DMCA takedown on GitHub

#41

Post by michaelmrose »

rvnx wrote: post #11
ajross wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not it. The LGPL doesn't require dynamic linking, just that any distributed artifacts be able to be used with derived versions of the LGPL code. Distributing buildable source under Apache 2.0 would surely qualify too. The problem here isn't a technical violation of the LGPL, it's that Rockchip doesn't own the copyright to FFMPEG and simply doesn't have the legal authority to release it under any license other…

Could there have been other / better moves with sending a reminder. I think the devs of that Chinese company seemed to immediately acknowledge the attribution. Now the OSS community loses the OSS code of IloveRockchip, and FFmpeg wins practically nothing, except recognition on a single file (that devs from Rockchip actually publicly acknowledged, though in a clumsy way) but loses in reputation and loses a commercial…

If you have to hound them to stop breaking the law they were already an adversary and the easiest way to comply would be to simply follow the license in which case everyone wins

Re: FFmpeg has issued a DMCA takedown on GitHub

#42

Post by akerl_ »

rvnx wrote: post #35
Blackthorn wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Deadline and reminders? They aren't teachers and Rockchip isn't a student, they are the victims here and Rockchip is the one at fault. Let's stop literally victim blaming them for how they responded.

To be clear: Rockchip is at fault, 100%. I would sue (and obv DMCA) any company who takes my code and refuses to attribute it. If you immediately escalate to [DMCA / court] because they refuse to fix, then that's very fair, but suddenly like 2 years after silence (if, and only if that was the case, because maybe they spoke outside of Twitter/X), then it's odd.

Maybe spend less time policing how other people are allowed to act, especially when you’re speculating wildly about the presence or content of communications

Re: FFmpeg has issued a DMCA takedown on GitHub

#43

Post by michaelmrose »

rvnx wrote: post #35
Blackthorn wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Deadline and reminders? They aren't teachers and Rockchip isn't a student, they are the victims here and Rockchip is the one at fault. Let's stop literally victim blaming them for how they responded.

To be clear: Rockchip is at fault, 100%. I would sue (and obv DMCA) any company who takes my code and refuses to attribute it. If you immediately escalate to [DMCA / court] because they refuse to fix, then that's very fair, but suddenly like 2 years after silence (if, and only if that was the case, because maybe they spoke outside of Twitter/X), then it's odd.

In the adult world you don't get any warnings when you break the law.

Re: FFmpeg has issued a DMCA takedown on GitHub

#44

Post by rvnx »

akerl_ wrote: post #42
rvnx wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be clear: Rockchip is at fault, 100%. I would sue (and obv DMCA) any company who takes my code and refuses to attribute it. If you immediately escalate to [DMCA / court] because they refuse to fix, then that's very fair, but suddenly like 2 years after silence (if, and only if that was the case, because maybe they spoke outside of Twitter/X), then it's odd.

Maybe spend less time policing how other people are allowed to act, especially when you’re speculating wildly about the presence or content of communications

It's a call to push the devs to freely say what happened in the background, there are many hints at that "I wonder if...?" "What could have happened that it escalated?" "Why there were no public reminders, what happened in the back", etc, etc, nothing much, these questions are deliberately open.

Re: FFmpeg has issued a DMCA takedown on GitHub

#46

Post by papercrane »

amszmidt wrote: post #40
merlindru wrote: post #2

The repo in question incorporated FFmpeg code while claiming their code is Apache 2.0-licensed over 1.5 years ago[1] This is not allowed under the LGPL, which mandates dynamic linking against the library. They copy-pasted FFmpeg code into their repo instead. [1] https://x.com/HermanChen1982/status/1761230920563233137

Incorporating compatible code, under different license is perfectly OK and each work can have different license, while the whole combined work is under the terms of another. I'm honestly quite confused what FFmpeg is objecting to here, if ILoveRockchip wrote code, under a compatible license (which Apache 2.0 is wrt. LGPLv2+ which FFmpeg is licensed under) -- then that seems perfectly fine. The repository in question…

The DMCA notice is available here: https://github.com/github/dmca/blob/master/2025/12/2025-12-1...

The notice has a list of files and says that they were copied from ffmpeg, removed the original copyright notice, added their own and licensed under the more permissive Apache license.

Re: FFmpeg has issued a DMCA takedown on GitHub

#47

Post by _zagj »

LargoLasskhyfv wrote: post #15

Clash of cultures. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shanzhai#Regulation vs. the 鬼子 鬼佬 老外

Not a fan of the CCP, but GH in general has a big problem with users not understanding and respecting licensing and passing off others' code as their own, sometimems unintentionally, often not.

Re: FFmpeg has issued a DMCA takedown on GitHub

#48

Post by akerl_ »

rvnx wrote: post #44
akerl_ wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe spend less time policing how other people are allowed to act, especially when you’re speculating wildly about the presence or content of communications

It's a call to push the devs to freely say what happened in the background, there are many hints at that "I wonder if...?" "What could have happened that it escalated?" "Why there were no public reminders, what happened in the back", etc, etc, nothing much, these questions are deliberately open.

Oh. Being rude and suggesting the devs made (in your opinion) a mistake based on your guess at their actions is not going to be an effective way to get them to elaborate on their legal strategy.

Also it’s rude, which is reason enough not to do it.

Re: FFmpeg has issued a DMCA takedown on GitHub

#50

Post by antonvs »

perryprog wrote: post #10
antonvs wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is working around accessing an embargoed site really any better than just accessing it directly? Morally, what's the difference? If everyone just actively boycotted that site, it would become irrelevant overnight. Anything else is simply condoning it continued existence. Don't kid yourself.

The issue is that you need an account to view the replies, not that there's a moral opposition to visiting the website (though it could be that too).

[flagged]
Post reply on HN