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uBlock Origin GPL code being stolen by team behind Honey browser extension

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Re: uBlock Origin GPL code being stolen by team behind Honey browser extension

#131

Post by DrewRWx »

echelon wrote: post #115
shwaj wrote: post #94

I know it’s not necessarily the same people, but it feels contradictory for this community to say “copyright infringement isn’t theft” when we’re talking about movies, but use the opposite language when talking about GPL source code.

Rhymes with horseshoe theory. People are willing to let behavior slide when it aligns with their interests, but will call it out when the "other team" does it. - Copyright abuse of games, movies, commercial software vs open source software - Censorship of conservative speech vs censorship of liberal speech - Genocide of one geopolitical entity vs another geopolitical entity - Separation of church/state with mandated…

Good thing the ends matter more than the means.

Re: uBlock Origin GPL code being stolen by team behind Honey browser extension

#132

Post by chinathrow »

twostorytower wrote: post #116
chinathrow wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I watched the video and I am pretty sure that the rage is warranted at this time. There is plenty of context given: Honey and their browser extension is swapping out cookies and lying about it to the end user - it does not matter if "everyone else is doing it as well". It's bad and it needs to stop.

They don't just swap out everyone's cookies. They comply their the affiliate network's "stand down" policies. Which means they don't actively try to poach commissions in the same shopping session. These are terms everyone agrees to, including creators. If it's the next day, most merchants don't pay out for referrals older than 24 hours anyways. So like I said, there are some legitimate problems with the affiliate ind…

Did we watch the same video? Where one commission was fully wiped out by Honey vs it would have been paid out if Honey was not installed?

Re: uBlock Origin GPL code being stolen by team behind Honey browser extension

#133

Post by mouse_ »

echelon wrote: post #115
shwaj wrote: post #94

I know it’s not necessarily the same people, but it feels contradictory for this community to say “copyright infringement isn’t theft” when we’re talking about movies, but use the opposite language when talking about GPL source code.

Rhymes with horseshoe theory. People are willing to let behavior slide when it aligns with their interests, but will call it out when the "other team" does it. - Copyright abuse of games, movies, commercial software vs open source software - Censorship of conservative speech vs censorship of liberal speech - Genocide of one geopolitical entity vs another geopolitical entity - Separation of church/state with mandated…

The problem is that enforcement is unequal and always seems to benefit the rich over the creators.

If I use Photoshop's 1's and 0's and don't follow Photoshop's rules, I could be bankrupt and thrown onto the streets, dramatically decreasing my life expectancy, or locked up and legally enslaved by Tyson Foods.

If PayPal, an 85 billion dollar market cap figure that has monopolized a large amount of digital commerce, uses our 1's and 0's and don't follow our rules, we're laughed at, because we are not an 85 billion dollar market cap figure.

I expect you understand this on some level.

> - Censorship of conservative speech vs censorship of liberal speech

How so? There are many left aligned websites that remove conservative content, and many conservative websites that remove lefty content, many sites that allow both and many sites that remove both. Perhaps I misunderstood, apologies if so.

Re: uBlock Origin GPL code being stolen by team behind Honey browser extension

#134

Post by canucker2016 »

mx20 wrote: post #100

Is he correct? That you can't have GPL files in your project without all code adhering to it? I thought it has to be linked static. So just calling a GPLed js library likely wouldn't be enough. I think the law is muddy here and not clear at all, even if the code is directly bundled.

He's correct.

GPL is called a viral license. Any project that you add GPL code to must be licensed under GPL (and made available to others under the GPL guidelines). That's why many commercial companies don't include GPL code - see Apple.

LGPL is typically meant for code packaged as a standalone library called from other, possibly non-GPL, code. You can distribute and call LGPL code from your code but your code does not have to be GPL/LGPL-licensed.

I believe the intent of LGPL was to have free LGPL versions of libraries where only popular non-LGPL libraries existed before. Any changes made to LGPL source code must be released under the usual LGPL/GPL guidelines, i.e. you can't make changes to LGPL code, release it in your project, yet keep the changes to yourself.

Re: uBlock Origin GPL code being stolen by team behind Honey browser extension

#135

Post by [deleted] »

traverseda wrote: post #120
shwaj wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree completely, and yet I would still prefer language to be used consistently.

I think the "information want to be free" crowd is very consistent. They want the information to be free. They don't want artificial scarcity. Sure they'll use IP as a means to an end, but that doesn't mean they believe IP is a good idea in general. It's just one of few tools that exist to solve it. In an ideal world all software would be forced to be FOSS, and we'd have to come up with ways of funding it that aren't…

[deleted]

Re: uBlock Origin GPL code being stolen by team behind Honey browser extension

#136

Post by tikhonj »

shwaj wrote: post #94

I know it’s not necessarily the same people, but it feels contradictory for this community to say “copyright infringement isn’t theft” when we’re talking about movies, but use the opposite language when talking about GPL source code.

The GPL does the exact opposite of copyright; the fact that it uses copyright to achieve that is just an implementation detail.

If you believe information should be free to share and remix, you would believe that copyright infringement is not theft and that not releasing code is wrong.

The fact that the proprietary code is based on GPL code just shows that the ex-Honey folks are hypocrites: they're trying to use copyright to control their code, but breaking the same rules in the way they reuse others' code.

Re: uBlock Origin GPL code being stolen by team behind Honey browser extension

#137

Post by twostorytower »

chinathrow wrote: post #132
twostorytower wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They don't just swap out everyone's cookies. They comply their the affiliate network's "stand down" policies. Which means they don't actively try to poach commissions in the same shopping session. These are terms everyone agrees to, including creators. If it's the next day, most merchants don't pay out for referrals older than 24 hours anyways. So like I said, there are some legitimate problems with the affiliate ind…

Did we watch the same video? Where one commission was fully wiped out by Honey vs it would have been paid out if Honey was not installed?

You can replicate his same case and see for yourself. Click an affiliate link and go to checkout. Honey won't pop-up like normal.

He doesn't provide the context for what his timescale is for his specific case. He cites that it can be up to 30 days later and Honey will still take the commission, which is true, but most merchants don't honor any cookies that are older than a day anyways.

I'm not saying this isn't a problem, it's just not a Honey-specific problem. If he actually wanted to influence change, he should cover the affiliate networks responsible for dictating this behavior (CJ, Impact, Rakuten, Awin, etc). The extensions are forced to comply by their rules.

Re: uBlock Origin GPL code being stolen by team behind Honey browser extension

#138

Post by Arnavion »

mx20 wrote: post #100

Is he correct? That you can't have GPL files in your project without all code adhering to it? I thought it has to be linked static. So just calling a GPLed js library likely wouldn't be enough. I think the law is muddy here and not clear at all, even if the code is directly bundled.

If the GPL code is an integrated part of your code, then you've created a derivative work, a "work based on the Program" as the GPL calls it. In this case your work must also be licensed as GPL.

>5. Conveying Modified Source Versions.

>You may convey a work based on the Program, or the modifications to produce it from the Program, in the form of source code under the terms of section 4, provided that you also meet all of these conditions:

>[...]

>c) You must license the entire work, as a whole, under this License to anyone who comes into possession of a copy. This License will therefore apply, along with any applicable section 7 additional terms, to the whole of the work, and all its parts, regardless of how they are packaged. This License gives no permission to license the work in any other way, but it does not invalidate such permission if you have separately received it.

It seems to be the case here since, as the top comment by RraaLL says, they've included GPL-licensed JavaScript from uBO in their extension.

Re: uBlock Origin GPL code being stolen by team behind Honey browser extension

#139

Post by twostorytower »

mrguyorama wrote: post #96
twostorytower wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This video is just rage bait and weaponizing creators and their fans by singling out Honey and not providing any additional context. Anybody in the affiliate industry knows how last click attribution works. This isn't new or specific to Honey. CapitalOne Shopping, Rakuten, RetailMeNot...they all work the same way. Merchants partner with these shopping extensions knowing how they work, nobody forces them to do so. The…

Stop spamming the same bullshit apologism over and over and over Nobody cares that other companies and extensions do the same thing, they're bad too.

I'm not saying this isn't a problem, it's just not a Honey-specific problem. If he actually wanted to influence change, he should cover the affiliate networks responsible for dictating this behavior (CJ, Impact, Rakuten, Awin, etc). The extensions are forced to comply by their rules.

Re: uBlock Origin GPL code being stolen by team behind Honey browser extension

#140

Post by twostorytower »

Arch485 wrote: post #112
twostorytower wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you assume they are always stealing a referral from somebody? Do you think everything people buy comes from a prior affiliate link? Yes, Honey makes money from affiliate commission. That money is funded by the merchants who voluntarily choose to partner with Honey. How is that scammy? In the rare case there is a prior referral, yes last click attribution comes into play. But that's the same for every shopping…

Are you on Honey's PR team now?

I don't know anyone over there anymore, just a few people back before they were acquired, from when I worked in the industry. I'm just trying to provide an industry perspective.
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