Posted on 09/21/2007 9:11:32 AM PDT by Ernest_at_the_Beach
ping!
So.. how long before a certain troll comes in to defend Monsoon and bemoan what a “trap” the GPL is, all the while conveniently neglecting that Monsoon is essentially engaged in theft by using other people’s work and intellectual property in violation of the license it is distributed under?
OSS Ping..
“Monsoon Multimedia’s marketing and sales operations are headquartered in the Silicon Valley in the US, while its main engineering and development operations are based in New Delhi, India.
The founders of the company founded Dazzle in 1996 where they developed the world’s first affordable PC hardware and software product to compress video based on MPEG standards. In 2000, they founded Emuzed where they pioneered the world’s first TIVO type product for the PC based on Microsoft’s Media Center PC operating system. In addition, they established a large Engineering center in Bangalore, India to provide software solutions for cell phone OEMs such as Nokia, Samsung, Texas Instruments and others. Dazzle was sold to SCM Microsystems in 1999 and Emuzed was sold to Flextronics in 2005, both for large returns to investors and shareholders.”
The GPL is a trap, set by the leftist moonbat Richard Stallman, otherwise known as “the father of free software” whose stated “ultimate goal” is “to make proprietary software obsolete”. Hopefully the contractual elements of his tricky license which he calls “copyleft” verses normal “copyright” will be deemed as unlawful without getting signatures on the dotted line.
Thank you for being so predictable.
No words of condemnation, I see, for the company trying to steal other people’s work and sell it as their own?
ORT will be here shortly to bemoan this poor little company which is violating US Copyright law..
Yea hopefully the guys who put their sweat into creating BusyBox can have their work stolen by another company without the compensation that they the copyright holders demand...
If they wanted to be compensated they shouldn’t have released it as “free” software.
Ge do you own the copyrights to the code from BusyBox? No? well then you dont get to tell the people who *do* own those copy rights what software license they can use. I know you believe you should be able to exercises quasi dictatorial powers to make sure everyone used a licenses which either:
(A) Locks the code down so nobody can see it, alter it
or
(B) Allows businesses to take the code and never contribute back to the project
But in the real world Freedom means people might licenses their software under terms *you* don't like. That does not mean you should endorse their copyrights be violated.
Anyone can cry about freedom and liberty when people are doing something they agree with but only people who really believe in freedom would protect those who are doing something you disagree with..
*****************************EXCERPTS**************************
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF NEW YORK
This is an action by Erik Andersen, an individual, and Rob Landley, an individual, (“Plain- tiffs”) by and through their attorneys, the Software Freedom Law Center, Inc., to recover damages arising from infringement of their copyrights by Monsoon Multimedia, Inc., (“Defendant”) and to enjoin Defendant’s future infringement. Specifically, Defendant distributed and continues to dis- tribute Plaintiffs’ copyrighted BusyBox software without Plaintiffs’ permission and despite the fact that Plaintiffs notified Defendant of its unlawful activity. Since Defendant has infringed Plaintiffs’ copyrights, and since that infringement is ongoing, Plaintiffs seek damages and injunctive relief.
******************************************
FACTUAL BACKGROUND 6. Plaintiffs are authors and developers of the BusyBox computer program, and the owners of copyrights in that computer program. BusyBox is a single computer program that comprises a set of computing tools and optimizes them for computers with limited resources, such as cell phones, PDAs and other small, specialized electronic devices. BusyBox is extremely customizable, fast and flexible, and, upon information and belief, is used in countless products sold by more than 100 manufacturers all over the world, including IBM, Nokia, Hewlett-Packard, and Siemens.
Free software defenders file suit against Monsoon Media over Linux
********************personal note and question *********************
This isn't really about LINUX is it?
Releasing it under the GPL allows them to be compensated by the additional contributions made by other. Just because the transaction doesn't involve cash doesn't mean there isn't an exchange of value.
The irony of the GPL is that, much to Stallman's chagrin, it actually reinforces the ideas of intellectual property ownership and fair compensation for the use of other people's work.
I’m just calmly pointing out the absurdity of someone releasing software they call “free” then coming back and making demands from those who took it. If it’s not actually “free” they shouldn’t be claiming it is, but it is typical of leftist nutjobs like Stallman to pull such tricks.
No this has nothing to do with Linux:
BusyBox: The Swiss Army Knife of Embedded Linux
BusyBox combines tiny versions of many common UNIX utilities into a single small executable. It provides replacements for most of the utilities you usually find in GNU fileutils, shellutils, etc. The utilities in BusyBox generally have fewer options than their full-featured GNU cousins; however, the options that are included provide the expected functionality and behave very much like their GNU counterparts. BusyBox provides a fairly complete environment for any small or embedded system.
BusyBox has been written with size-optimization and limited resources in mind. It is also extremely modular so you can easily include or exclude commands (or features) at compile time. This makes it easy to customize your embedded systems. To create a working system, just add some device nodes in /dev, a few configuration files in /etc, and a Linux kernel.
BusyBox is maintained by Denis Vlasenko, and licensed under the GNU GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE version 2.
It can run on multiple operating systems.
Hmm I looked at the website for busybox and in the about I dont see 'This software is free' I see this:
"Anyone thinking of shipping BusyBox as part of a product should be familiar with the licensing terms under which they are allowed to use and distribute BusyBox. Read the full test of the GPL (either through the above link, or in the file LICENSE in the busybox tarball), and also read the Frequently Asked Questions about the GPL." -- http://www.busybox.net/license.html
"Basically, if you distribute GPL software the license requires that you also distribute the source code to that GPL-licensed software. So if you distribute BusyBox without making the source code to the version you distribute available, you violate the license terms, and thus infringe on the copyrights of BusyBox. (This requirement applies whether or not you modified BusyBox; either way the license terms still apply to you.) Read the license text for the details." -- http://www.busybox.net/license.html
I just spent two minutes on their site and got this much information.
Whatever the license might be 'called' the terms that the copyright holders put on the software is *crystal* clear.
Now this is not the first time you have advocated stripping away copyrights for folks who choose a license you dont like and I suspect it wont be the last but no matter how you spin it you're are playing 'some animals are more equal than others' game
“From each according to his ability, and to each according to his need” or something like that?
“All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others”
%s/animals/Copyrights
Something like that?
Anything released under the GPL license is considered “free software” by the creator of the license. It’s also the “software freedom law center” that’s bringing the charges forth, which is probably just another one of Stallman’s many fronts. Get them all to quit misusing the word “free” if you want fewer misconceptions about whether it’s actually “free” or not.
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