21–30 of 271 posts
https://medium.com/@henvic/opensource-and-go-what-license-f6...
It's interesting to see these tracing app discussions crop up all over the world at the moment. In Germany it quite literally took dozens of public interest groups, two weeks of media attention, EU guidance and an open letter by hundreds of scientists to make the government switch from central data collection to an acceptable decentralised approach. The amount of misinformation put out by lobby groups in the process…
They said they would release source, but they've distributed the app first, so are in breach. They also said location would not be used, but android.permission.ACCESS_FINE_LOCATION Can't trust them on things that can be checked; therefore can't trust them on the things that that can't be checked.
Yes, I thought they said a few days ago that the source code will be made available for scrutiny but this now how its being reported: "Some, if not all, of the app’s source code will be made public."
I would assume many GPL-licensed applications are GPL non-compliant. From a user's perspective, what are the most relevant problems when this is the case? (Excluding problems of philosophical nature that only free software geeks care about. No intention to be disrespectful; but the more practical the problems, the more likely it is that ordinary users can relate to them.)
So I would not mix the two issues of a problem being a real problem and people's lack of knowledge about the software licensing world or software in general. Just because people don't know what the actual root cause is, it does not mean, that the problem does not exist, or that the people will not care about consequences, that will affect them.
I will also say,that without idealism of many great people creating free software and little pockets of free society, we would not be, where we are today. A very general statement, I know, but I have no doubt in my mind, that the idea of making knowledge freely available and making sure it stays that way does help advance society in many areas.
They said they would release source, but they've distributed the app first, so are in breach. They also said location would not be used, but android.permission.ACCESS_FINE_LOCATION Can't trust them on things that can be checked; therefore can't trust them on the things that that can't be checked.
https://developer.android.com/guide/topics/connectivity/blue...
They said they would release source, but they've distributed the app first, so are in breach. They also said location would not be used, but android.permission.ACCESS_FINE_LOCATION Can't trust them on things that can be checked; therefore can't trust them on the things that that can't be checked.
It was interesting to hear a lead story on the nightly news talking about data privacy issues related to where the data was stored, saying that the data would be stored on “American company Amazon’s Servers”. No mention of Australian regions or GovCloud etc.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Uhm, no. Once your code contains GPL code that is not yours , it has to be GPL. Particularly in v3, where a number of loopholes were closed. You are free to attach further non-conflicting clauses to it, but the GPL of the original code must be respected. That’s the entire point of the GPL. Double-licensing requires you to have ownership of the entire codebase. At that point, you are licensing everything , so you’re f…
You're agreeing with the OP. The point they were making was that the Australian government could've gotten the source code under an alternative license by asking the sole copyright holder (which I believe is either the Singaporean government, or a contractor of the Singaporean government). But to be honest, as an Aussie I don't think our government is remotely competent enough to have considered the copyright license…
Were they? Where did you see that?
The Health Dept's response to the Privacy Impact Assessment's recommendation for release of the app's source code says as follows:
Agreed. The PIA and source code will be released subject to consultation with the Australian Signals Directorate’s Australian Cyber Security Centre
(https://www.health.gov.au/resources/publications/covidsafe-a...)
Now that 'consultation' might be a delaying tactic, but it's just as likely to be that the Dept. of Health has no idea of the implications of such release. It certainly doesn't suggest the revocation you claim.
It was interesting to hear a lead story on the nightly news talking about data privacy issues related to where the data was stored, saying that the data would be stored on “American company Amazon’s Servers”. No mention of Australian regions or GovCloud etc.
I was in a casual virtual meeting with a group of highly educated audience last week, and the question of whether or not we will install the app came up. As far as I know none of them has a background in computer science or anything related to software development. At least a third of the group immediately said that the won't install the app exactly for the “American company Amazon’s Servers” reason. I hadn't researc…
They said they would release source, but they've distributed the app first, so are in breach. They also said location would not be used, but android.permission.ACCESS_FINE_LOCATION Can't trust them on things that can be checked; therefore can't trust them on the things that that can't be checked.
In fact it doesn’t even appear on the list of apps when you go to Privacy -> Location services.
So appears to be an Android thing.