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Pebble, Rebble, and a path forward

ericmigi.com

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Re: Pebble, Rebble, and a path forward

#211

Post by realo »

Brian_K_White wrote: post #209
realo wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Core is making new, compatible hardware, at scale, not as a hobby. We can buy that hardware from Core, today. That gives them quite a few rights.

What? Absurd. It gives them the right to nothing at all. They can make an app store themselves any time they want.

Well... I have a watchface on the old store. It is non functional because external APIs changed. I just recently decided to update it, and there is now a much improved version in my github account.

I asked Rebble weeks (!!) ago to give me back access to my own account and binaries on their store and to this day, I heard nothing from them. Nada.

If Core start a new store, I will immediately put the new, much improved version of my old watch face on their store. Rebble can keep the old, non-functional one in their archive if they want.

Re: Pebble, Rebble, and a path forward

#212

Post by Brian_K_White »

1shooner wrote: post #176
Brian_K_White wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is not wrong. All I said was that Rebble has demonstrated that they respect copyright. Taking down an app on request means you acknowledge that the person making the request has the right to do so. It's true that a rightsholder could go further and sue for damages, and maybe even win. So what? The last time that happened, was Rebble actually found guilty of operating in bad faith? Were the damages significant or t…

>Rebble has demonstrated that they respect copyright. Have they not been redistributing copyrighted material without a license to do so?

Immaterial. What business is that of Core's?

And if no copyright holder asserts their rights to Rebble, then you can't show any harm or bad faith operation by Rebble.

Put it this way, if handling the abandoned material is intrinsically wrong without a harmed party, then why can't you go accuse them of a crime right now and have the police deal with them like you could if you witnessed an act of violence or property damage?

Because it's not so cut and dried. A thing can be not explicitly legal and yet still not wrong or harmful. A thing can be undetermined until forced to be determined some how by some actual injured party with some actual right to claim that injury and the receipts to defend the claim.

So IF you are an app owner then you can assert your ownership and claim that Rebble infringed on you. Even if you can't prove that there was ever any monetary value, you might still be owed something just for punitive.

But Core is no such injured party.

And this blows my mind, after all this arguing, Core actually hass access to the apps free and clear all along. They are right there in a github free to clone.

All arguments based on the apps or access to a copy of the apps are right the fuck out the window. As they were all along anyway even if the apps were on a private server behind that no-scraping agreement.

Re: Pebble, Rebble, and a path forward

#213

Post by burnt-resistor »

The tao of open source: never invest time/money/effort you aren't comfortable giving away, other people using, and someone else forking perhaps as a commercial offering.

There are undoubtedly those preach GPL 3 and AGPL zealous control freakery but it's pretending to be "free" while dictating what can and can't be done with code. If the agreement attempts to discriminate against users selectively, it ain't free or open. GPL 2 is the line in the sand.

Re: Pebble, Rebble, and a path forward

#214

Post by poisonborz »

burnt-resistor wrote: post #213

The tao of open source: never invest time/money/effort you aren't comfortable giving away, other people using, and someone else forking perhaps as a commercial offering. There are undoubtedly those preach GPL 3 and AGPL zealous control freakery but it's pretending to be "free" while dictating what can and can't be done with code. If the agreement attempts to discriminate against users selectively, it ain't free or op…

You confuse open source with free software, and all the shades of it.

GPL/copyleft exist because some people make products because they want to help and improve a community. Not just to let the product go in the wind, "whatever happens to it" (meaning corporations using it for profit extraction and/or the exact opposite goals). Even if AI made this less defendable by legal means.

This isn't because these people are "control freaks", but because of their beliefs and purposefully chosen legal framework.

Re: Pebble, Rebble, and a path forward

#215

Post by neumann »

mmastrac wrote: post #189
apparent wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> How can you trust someone who's willing to violate your privacy like that? Who's to say he didn't have permission to post from his conversation partner? He doesn't need permission from the people he's talking about (just like we don't need his permission to post about him here).

> Who's to say https://www.reddit.com/r/pebble/comments/1p0huk5/comment/npj...

Ouch. I think most people would assume he got permission, so this is a bit ugh

Re: Pebble, Rebble, and a path forward

#216

Post by intothemild »

infotainment wrote: post #103
xyzzy_plugh wrote: post #10

I view this entire thing through an extremely simple, reductive lens: Rebble effectively had free reign on this ecosystem for years, and could have at any time decided to try and capitalize on it further. They still can! But instead they're apparently interested in rent seeking while Core makes real headway. It's clear that Eric and Core want to make something now. It's not clear what Rebble wants, but it's clear the…

Agreed -- While I admire their work in keeping the lights on, Rebble doesn't necessarily make sense in a world where the "real" Pebble company has returned. Keep in mind that this is their goal statement (straight from their FAQ): > Our goal is to maintain and advance Pebble functionality, in the absence of Pebble Technology Corp. Eric's new company, by effectively re-creating Pebble Technology Corp, is an existentia…

Could pebble2 launch with a minimal set of apps, asking the old Devs to push their binaries again? Sure, and with that in mind, all this deal with rebble does is save everyone time.

The way this reads, is a group of enthusiasts got together to create a lifeboat for people who wanted to keep their pebble devices alive... But are now building a moat around said life raft.

If they truly cared about the devices, the users, and the developers.. they would just drop this attitude and move forward.

Another interpretation is that for rebble the worst thing that could happen, was Eric coming back and restarting pebble.

Re: Pebble, Rebble, and a path forward

#217

Post by tomaskafka »

chias wrote: post #207
tomaskafka wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am one of the developers who did make Pebble apps - here's a screenshot with the Pebble version of Weathergraph on Eric's watch: https://x.com/weathergraph/status/1959253197664469246 Today is the day I found out Rebble is claiming the ownership of my app's binaries. All I can say is that they don't have it.

Not really relevant to the conversation, but: I stumbled across your watchface recently and absolutely love it. It's remarkable how much information density you've achieved while still maintaining "at a glance" clarity. Thank you for the work you put into it!

Thank you!

Re: Pebble, Rebble, and a path forward

#218

Post by [deleted] »

radlad wrote: post #55
eptcyka wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So they cashflowed the services they provided. And they’re not hunderds of thousands of dollars out of pocket on this, right? So what are they complaining about? Are they worried about losing their revenue stream or what?

This thread started with OP calling Pebble rentseeking and used the subscription services as an example. I replied to point out that the subscription fees were used to fund services and development - they weren't profit. Then the thread went off the rails with some claiming that spending money is proof that Rebble is incompetent and others claiming that they shouldn't be whining about spending money (which they weren…

[deleted]

Re: Pebble, Rebble, and a path forward

#219

Post by philipallstar »

radlad wrote: post #55
eptcyka wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So they cashflowed the services they provided. And they’re not hunderds of thousands of dollars out of pocket on this, right? So what are they complaining about? Are they worried about losing their revenue stream or what?

This thread started with OP calling Pebble rentseeking and used the subscription services as an example. I replied to point out that the subscription fees were used to fund services and development - they weren't profit. Then the thread went off the rails with some claiming that spending money is proof that Rebble is incompetent and others claiming that they shouldn't be whining about spending money (which they weren…

> Stated elsewhere in thread, I believe the primary concern is that Rebble will import the data into a separate, closed app store owned by Pebble, which Pebble will lock Rebble out of

This is what Rebble is doing right now.

The proposal as per the article by Pebble is for Rebble to keep hosting, and for Pebble to pay them to do that. Why would Pebble move things into a closed store when their openness last time is what allowed Rebble to scrape all the apps in the first place? Only Rebble has behaved like this.

Re: Pebble, Rebble, and a path forward

#220

Post by philipallstar »

computably wrote: post #142
infotainment wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed -- While I admire their work in keeping the lights on, Rebble doesn't necessarily make sense in a world where the "real" Pebble company has returned. Keep in mind that this is their goal statement (straight from their FAQ): > Our goal is to maintain and advance Pebble functionality, in the absence of Pebble Technology Corp. Eric's new company, by effectively re-creating Pebble Technology Corp, is an existentia…

Alternatively, I could say that Eric Migicovsky's track record is building a for-profit company that ultimately failed, and with the new company, he obviously, explicitly intends to prioritize selling new hardware. Whereas Rebble kept the lights on for devices that would otherwise have been bricks, as a collective of volunteer hackers. Their missions conflict because Pebble2's potential customers largely overlap with…

You could also say his track record is making things as open as possible so things like Rebble can spring up if necessary, but also in negotating deals that keep core services running for years after the purchase, and then after the purchaser's purchase.
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