Good coders borrow, great coders steal • Hacker News Board

Re: Good coders borrow, great coders steal

#41

Post by fermienrico » Fri, May 22, 2020, 7:44 PM UTC

klyrs wrote: post #39

fermienrico wrote: post #28

I like how the west is worried about copying/pasting some code and whether that would lead to some obscure licensing issue in the future where lawyers battle it out for 4 years, costing $3M in attorney fees; while some engineer in Shenzhen going off and copying stuff without any worries and infact openly teaching others in his team to learn how to cook some copy pasta. IMO software licensing and patent litigations, a…

> When I write any code, I take 2 options: 1) Don't share it publicly or 2) Completely release it as public domain. No need for MIT license or any of that crap. Here, just take the code and go win the world, I don't need any credit. Ask yourself how you've benefited from someone crediting you if at all it comes back to you. I had a similar philosophy in my youth, and it still resonates with me. Hanging around Slashdo…

I can get behind CYA license use. I think all of them have some kind of a clause - “You have no rights to sue me and no implied warranty” sounds logical.

Re: Good coders borrow, great coders steal

#42

Post by jdsully » Fri, May 22, 2020, 8:18 PM UTC

shadowgovt wrote: post #32

fermienrico wrote: post #28

I like how the west is worried about copying/pasting some code and whether that would lead to some obscure licensing issue in the future where lawyers battle it out for 4 years, costing $3M in attorney fees; while some engineer in Shenzhen going off and copying stuff without any worries and infact openly teaching others in his team to learn how to cook some copy pasta. IMO software licensing and patent litigations, a…

> Not everyone is interested in open sourcing their work - but somehow that's looked down upon. Why!? It is their work and respect it, there are so many people with pitch fork entitlement. The pitchfork entitlement, to my observation, is reactionary to the force of law backing something that should be an individual's responsibility if they want to keep it secret but not supported by the threat of government-sanctione…

Funny enough Teller, from Penn & Teller fame is attempting to use copyright to prevent his tricks from being revealed.

Re: Good coders borrow, great coders steal

#43

Post by rxsel » Fri, May 22, 2020, 8:18 PM UTC

To be completely honest, if you're smart, and focused on shipping product you really don't care and will find a way to steal while at the same time obfuscate to the point where no one will notice or care. I get there's a moral dilemma for some, and credit etc. comes into play, but I can assure you the people that are solely focused on getting $#!t shipped really don't care, and by the time they have to they will have either sank or have enough resources to handle it.

Re: Good coders borrow, great coders steal

#44

Post by [deleted] » Fri, May 22, 2020, 8:22 PM UTC

[deleted]

Re: Good coders borrow, great coders steal

#45

Post by gremlinsinc » Fri, May 22, 2020, 8:28 PM UTC

rxsel wrote: post #43

To be completely honest, if you're smart, and focused on shipping product you really don't care and will find a way to steal while at the same time obfuscate to the point where no one will notice or care. I get there's a moral dilemma for some, and credit etc. comes into play, but I can assure you the people that are solely focused on getting $#!t shipped really don't care, and by the time they have to they will have…

To add to this, I don't think there's any function really that I haven't had to customize/make my own... I mean add a few params, change or transform the output or even convert js to php or python.

I think I can maybe count on 1 hand the times I've literally copied/pasted and left it as is. Usually it's copying some config file for a laravel package or something because there were some changes and I'm combining them on an upgrade or something.

Re: Good coders borrow, great coders steal

#46

Post by kyleee » Fri, May 22, 2020, 8:45 PM UTC

neonate wrote: post #29

What is this article actually saying? Sometimes programmers copy-paste things, and that's ok except when it isn't, and something something Van Gogh? Is there more to it that I missed?

This is probably just stackoverflow's mediocre content strategy, they're trying to get some distance between all of their gaffes (the unilateral re-licensing of content, the monica celio mod debacle, etc.)

Re: Good coders borrow, great coders steal

#47

Post by bsder » Fri, May 22, 2020, 8:56 PM UTC

shadowgovt wrote: post #32

fermienrico wrote: post #28

I like how the west is worried about copying/pasting some code and whether that would lead to some obscure licensing issue in the future where lawyers battle it out for 4 years, costing $3M in attorney fees; while some engineer in Shenzhen going off and copying stuff without any worries and infact openly teaching others in his team to learn how to cook some copy pasta. IMO software licensing and patent litigations, a…

> Not everyone is interested in open sourcing their work - but somehow that's looked down upon. Why!? It is their work and respect it, there are so many people with pitch fork entitlement. The pitchfork entitlement, to my observation, is reactionary to the force of law backing something that should be an individual's responsibility if they want to keep it secret but not supported by the threat of government-sanctione…

> But what's the ramification if somebody figures a trick out and publishes it? It certainly isn't a crime.

Um, actually it can be. Many magic tricks can be both copyrighted and patented.

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/thr-esq/teller-wins-lawsui...

Re: Good coders borrow, great coders steal

#48

Post by ChrisMarshallNY » Fri, May 22, 2020, 9:19 PM UTC

fermienrico wrote: post #41

klyrs wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> When I write any code, I take 2 options: 1) Don't share it publicly or 2) Completely release it as public domain. No need for MIT license or any of that crap. Here, just take the code and go win the world, I don't need any credit. Ask yourself how you've benefited from someone crediting you if at all it comes back to you. I had a similar philosophy in my youth, and it still resonates with me. Hanging around Slashdo…

I can get behind CYA license use. I think all of them have some kind of a clause - “You have no rights to sue me and no implied warranty” sounds logical.

I use MIT for everything. I don't like coercive licenses, but that CYA is important.

America is the Land of the [Lawyers'] Fee. I can't remember the site, but someone has a site, dedicated to all the stupid, ridiculous, double-facepalm lawsuits the US "enjoys."

It is quite common for people to be [successfully] sued for trying to help someone else.

I remember taking a CPR class, where we were told that, if we gave CPR, we could be sued.

So there's actually a reason why someone might stand back, and watch you die...

Re: Good coders borrow, great coders steal

#49

Post by boyter » Fri, May 22, 2020, 9:24 PM UTC

fermienrico wrote: post #28

I like how the west is worried about copying/pasting some code and whether that would lead to some obscure licensing issue in the future where lawyers battle it out for 4 years, costing $3M in attorney fees; while some engineer in Shenzhen going off and copying stuff without any worries and infact openly teaching others in his team to learn how to cook some copy pasta. IMO software licensing and patent litigations, a…

Option 2 specifically public domain isn’t an option for people form some countries like Australia or Germany. They cannot put anything public domain. So please license things and go with MIT or Unlicence if you want it as free as possible.

Re: Good coders borrow, great coders steal

#50

Post by dTal » Fri, May 22, 2020, 9:30 PM UTC

jdsully wrote: post #42

shadowgovt wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Not everyone is interested in open sourcing their work - but somehow that's looked down upon. Why!? It is their work and respect it, there are so many people with pitch fork entitlement. The pitchfork entitlement, to my observation, is reactionary to the force of law backing something that should be an individual's responsibility if they want to keep it secret but not supported by the threat of government-sanctione…

Funny enough Teller, from Penn & Teller fame is attempting to use copyright to prevent his tricks from being revealed.

That's a slightly different case. It's not the stealing of the method that Teller objects to - it's the stealing of the act. The aesthetic, the script of the performance. Which I think is fair - it's an exceptionally artistic act, and performing it as one's own is rather like performing a song written by someone else without crediting them.

I don't think magical methods can be copyright. At best, they can be patented. It's not even clear that the copycat act uses the same method! But that's besides the point completely.