Getting forked by Microsoft • Hacker News Board

Re: Getting forked by Microsoft

#391

Post by pjmlp » Mon, Apr 21, 2025, 3:09 PM UTC

yownie wrote: post #234

diggan wrote: post #3

> As a sole maintainer of an open source project, I was enthused when Microsoft reached out to set up a meeting to talk about Spegel. The meeting went well, and I felt there was going to be a path forward ripe with cooperation and hopefully a place where I could onboard new maintainers. Seems it isn't the first time Microsoft leads open source maintainers on, trying to extract information about their projects so they…

The cultural amnesia about how these companies have operated in the past and continue to operate just continues to boggle me. It's as if we've learned nothing about exploitative corporation behavior for the last 20-30 years even though it's in the news EVERY other day.

What can you expect when the same group of folks has given the control of the Web to Google served on a plate?

Re: Getting forked by Microsoft

#392

Post by palata » Mon, Apr 21, 2025, 3:10 PM UTC

greatgib wrote: post #362

udev4096 wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Blatantly copying the code without proper attribution is a violation. Regardless, it's not your issue to be OK with it, if the author himself is uncomfortable with it

It all depends if the code was copied for a big part or just snippets.

But it doesn't here! You are totally allowed to completely copy an MIT file, modify it and add your copyright to it!

You should just keep the copyright that is already present in the file! But in the case of Spegel, I don't think that the files contain a copyright header in the first place.

Re: Getting forked by Microsoft

#393

Post by vinceguidry » Mon, Apr 21, 2025, 3:11 PM UTC

koiueo wrote: post #314

vinceguidry wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple doesn't ship any of these anymore.

And guess what application developers install immediately after getting their MacBooks? The GPL licensed git. If I'm forced to use MacOS, I'm fine installing git, GNU make or whatever I want for myself. But I don't see any downsides in Apple being unable to distribute those applications together with their OS.

Last time I was forced to use MacOS, I did all my work in a Linux VM. And still hated it.

Re: Getting forked by Microsoft

#394

Post by seqizz » Mon, Apr 21, 2025, 3:12 PM UTC

talkingtab wrote: post #84

My personal thought is that we need a new kind of license: community open source. No corporations, just community. The problem this addresses is not that Microsoft forked this project. The problem is that when a corporation like Microsoft does this, they harm our community[0]. Open source thrives because a bunch of individuals and groups collaborate. Microsoft, is built around the concept of profit for stock owners a…

How about post-open license? https://postopen.org/

Re: Getting forked by Microsoft

#395

Post by bogwog » Mon, Apr 21, 2025, 3:12 PM UTC

This sucks and I feel for the maintainer, but it really is their own fault for publishing as MIT. However, that is a pretty common mistake that most people never learn until they've been screwed by it. The OSI have done a good job at convincing devs to open themselves up to exploitation for the benefit of big tech companies, and I find it hard to fault people for falling for that. The social pressure is very high.

But giving a (presumably) free consultation to Microsoft is a self-own. History has shown that you should never give the benefit of the doubt to Microsoft, and you should certainly never trust them (unless you have a contract and a good lawyer). Not knowing this can only be the result of willful ignorance. I can't offer sympathy for that.

Hopefully, this person learned the right lessons from this experience.

Re: Getting forked by Microsoft

#396

Post by ptx » Mon, Apr 21, 2025, 3:12 PM UTC

palata wrote: post #384

WD-42 wrote: post #345

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems like a pretty minor violation, to be fair. They do reference the project in the repo. The real question is why did the author choose MIT if they didn’t want allow mega corps to benefit from their work without contributing back. That’s a feature of the license, not a bug.

People here keep saying that they removed copyright headers. I can't find a single copyright header in the Spegel source files. Can someone help me find which headers Microsoft actually removed? What I see is that Microsoft added headers to their Peerd files. Now they read "Copyright Microsoft", which is correct because Microsoft owns some copyright over those modified files. If those files had had a "Copyright Spege…

It's in the license file: https://github.com/spegel-org/spegel/commits/main/LICENSE

Re: Getting forked by Microsoft

#397

Post by simondotau » Mon, Apr 21, 2025, 3:12 PM UTC

0xTJ wrote: post #367

consp wrote: post #252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would like a relatively permissive software license which forbids any profiteering (CC-NC but then strictly software). I'm fine with people using my code, not fine with companies profiteering off my work. If you want to use it commercially, pay for it.

If it can't be used commercially, then that's not an open-source license. If you choose to license your work that way, that's your choice, but you're not making something open-source.

Who said it can’t be used commercially? Just because they can’t profit from it doesn’t stop them using it.

Re: Getting forked by Microsoft

#398

Post by palata » Mon, Apr 21, 2025, 3:12 PM UTC

robmccoll wrote: post #291

orochimaaru wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don’t entertain meetings without compensation from megacrop. But the project is open source. The author provided the right for them to take it in any way possible and copy it. If I’m not mistaken the MIT license allows what they did. I’m assuming the complaint is more about Microsoft duplicity in asking for information as opposed to the forking of the code. The latter is fine - the license explicitly allows it.

You are mistaken. The license explicitly allows it subject to the terms of the license: > The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software. Microsoft didn't follow these terms. They copied "substantial portions of the Software" and didn't include the notice.

Which notice? None of the *.go source files I have opened in Spegel contain a notice. Microsoft cannot remove a notice that does not exist...

In my opinion, it's the Spegel author's fault: they should have added a notice in every single file!

Re: Getting forked by Microsoft

#399

Post by palata » Mon, Apr 21, 2025, 3:14 PM UTC

pritambaral wrote: post #251

pjmlp wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

MIT License.

Violated by the removal of author's copyright notice.

Everybody claims they removed the author's copyright notice. I checked many source files in Spegel, and none of them contain an MIT header with copyright.

I don't think Microsoft removed the copyright notice. I think that the original author did not add one...

Re: Getting forked by Microsoft

#400

Post by trelane » Mon, Apr 21, 2025, 3:14 PM UTC

zamadatix wrote: post #228

panzi wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So they don't use Linux, bash, or GCC?

Change "use" to "distribute" (what the license cares about) and you're bang on.

This is a huge difference. The GPL and its flavor are explicitly not about use. They place zero restrictions on use. Unlike, say, just about all proprietary software.

It only governs distribution and especially prevents distributors from locking their users in, and from placing restrictions on their users' use of the software.