Joshua Nightshade

I disagree.

But like I said, you can still DMCA it; it will likely be taken down for a few hours, you'll be on Sakai's shitlist, then he'll counterfile and get his site back.

At which point you have to sue.

Not to mention that you have to be copyright owner (or acting on their behalf with their permission) to file a DMCA on infringing material at all. So unless you have anything in the LL viewer, you're not allowed to DMCA for them. Gigs seems to be the only person here so far who would have a legitimate stake.

So either application will still result in the necessity of a lawsuit, meaning you don't accomplish anything but be annoying and overstepping use of what's already an extremely overstepping law to begin with.

Gareth Nelson

Even though it's in their best interests, LL are notoriously slow to act. I think it would be wise for anyone who has a copyright in the viewer code to clamp down on this, since the GPL means absolutely nothing if it isn't enforced.

Getting it slashdotted could actually be overkill I agree, but not because it'd give opensim or SL a bad reputation - slashdotters would probably view it in the same way as busybox has been repeatedly exploited. The reason it'd be overkill is because it's simply not necessary to bring so much attention to the matter yet, and I emphasise "yet".

Gareth Nelson

Not sure how you can say it's overstepping - it's a matter of copyright infringement, just the same legally as if someone was hosting a binary of the Windows XP install CD ISO. The only difference is that it would be allowed if source was provided.

Anyway, I know that I personally can't do a thing on this as I do not have any patches in the viewer (this is due to the contributor agreement - stuff like onrez confirmed that as a bad thing in my mind), so i'm asking any other viewer devs to do this.

If Sakai gets the site shutdown temporarily over this, he might realise it's a serious matter and not just people bitching over nothing. Of course it'd be preferable that it's sorted out in other ways first, but that isn't happening.

Gareth Nelson

The server code has nothing to do with this. But their hosting provider is involved in that they are the ones hosting the webserver where the viewer binary is served from. It's pretty standard practice to go to a site's hosting provider after the site's owner has failed to respond to legal complaints.

Joshua Nightshade

Presumably LL discovered this hours ago. As you said, they're slow to act. This isn't a crisis of epic proportions necessitating the shutdown of someone's business because they failed to comply with what is, really, not the biggest of deals.

That's why it's overreaching. While I agree that they need to honor the terms of the license, it's for LL to decide if they aren't. Going to lengths like this to disable Sakai's company over something rather petty in the long run is nasty, in my opinion. Especially given the fact that this isn't an emergency.

And I say this as someone who really dislikes Sakai and OLG even less.

Gareth Nelson

It's not just a small deal looking at OLG's behaviour thus far which has been essentially very sneaky tricks aimed at vendor lockin - one thing which the GPL was designed to prevent.

Legally, it's up to LL or anyone with a patch in the viewer to do something about this, ethically it's up to the whole community to apply pressure. As i've already said, the GPL means absolutely nothing if it isn't enforced. Whether or not you actually believe that the political goals behind the GPL are a good thing (and I suspect most commercial entities only use it to prevent competitors from hiding improvements rather than the original goals) you have to concede it is just as much a matter of copyright as any other license including even the windows EULA.

I'd go so far as to say that distributing a binary of a GPLed app without source is in fact worse than distributing a pirated copy of windows, since it's a slap in the face to anyone who cares about the freedoms the GPL is designed to protect.

Not to mention that this won't "disable Sakai's company" - it'll result in one server being taken offline until compliance is fixed, hopefully giving Sakai a kick in the backside to sort out this very simple legal matter.

Gareth Nelson

Another point, LL discovered this not "hours ago" but at least a few weeks ago. I reported the issue to Rob Linden myself upon noticing that something was up and was told they are already aware. However, LL's legal department do nothing publically so it's difficult to know what (if anything) they're actually doing, especially considering how much time they've had.

Joshua Nightshade

Ultimately, it's not your fight; and unless you're designing a viewer that can benefit from this, it's hardly even your interest. If LL does or doesn't do something, it's their license. What more do you expect? The "community putting pressure" is pretty ridiculous. The GPL won't disappear into a puff of smoke if LL takes their time or does nothing at all.

This reeks of busybody and misapplied principles.

Gareth Nelson

It is my fight, it's the fight of everyone who actually cares about the principles at stake, which you delightfully label as "misapplied". Even if I did not have any interest in doing my own viewer development (I do in fact, just not under LL's contributor agreement), i'd still have a valid interest in not sitting by idly while people work against the community which I am part of.

Joshua Nightshade

All right, so it is just some irrelevant personal crusade then, as I got the vibe from to begin with.

Hope that works out for you.

Gareth Nelson

Actually, it might as well - if nobody enforces the GPL, the viewer might as well just be BSD licensed (i'm sure that would appeal to many !)

Joshua Nightshade

I also hope that you don't ever put any projects on US hosted servers, so you don't have some other noble crusader misapplying the same "principles" against you one day and cavalierly fucking with your business because they feel it's their fight.

Because misapplications of bullying copyright law matters more to me than you getting sussed because you can't have the code immediately for something you aren't even interested in working on.

Gareth Nelson

Yeah, I have a habit of getting pissed off at GPL violations since that beautiful little document has benefited me so much, and i'd rather like to not see it become utterly pointless with SL.

Eirik

It's not misapplication. It's heavy-handed yes, and I don't think DMCAing is a good idea.

But not following the GPL License when distributing GPLd software IS copyrights infringement and thus perfectly applicable to DMCA from all I can see.

__________________

Gareth Nelson

I'm not in the habit of violating licenses, so the only thing i'd have to fear is fraudulent use of these laws - not legit use as you seem to be against. As a matter of fact, I prefer US hosting companies for most things and I am fully prepared to act if someone does end up sending fraudulent notices.

Joshua Nightshade

For Linden Lab.

It appears that Gareth is dissatisfied that LL hasn't responded to a violation of their own license with the rapidity he expects them to, and is upset about that. He's calling out the GPL militia to arm themselves with pitchforks and rakes to "pressure" something he doesn't even know if LL even cares about.

Which is more than a little ridiculous to me.

I also remember when this same sortof thing happened with KirstenLee's personal viewer everyone was ticked off that zealots who had no personal interest in the code badgered her into saying "fuck this" all together.

Gareth what will you do if LL looks at this and decides to shrug and carry it absolutely no further?

Gareth Nelson

What would be a good idea?
Numerous people have asked them to comply with no response, the only real ways to move forward are jumping straight into court (unrealistic) or the lesser action of filing a DMCA notice.

Eirik

And for others who have written GPL code that's been included into 3DX Viewer.

But I see what you mean specifically now. And I agree with you this far.

Boy Lane

@Gareth
I started this thread. It was never intended to start a war against OLG or Sakai or KLee or whoever. It was meant to make OLG and everybody else aware that this is not a playground to modify and distribute binaries for "virtual worlds" as one thinks he can do; by potentially introducing mal and spyware, perhaps even find a way to manipulate or destroy inventory or eventually steal money <add more>. These are things that affect us all, these are the things that cause all kind of bad reputations and FUD, and these are the things we all should try to fight. To provide sources is an effective way to prevent exactly that from happening.

As Joshua wrote it is no emergency and by far no reason to shot anyones operations down. OLG is a business, they employ people and they pay salaries. But they have to learn to operate in a legal environment and follow licenses and laws.

Linden Lab is well aware of these things now. There were many reports about OLG and their practices. There will be sufficient action from LL and their legal advise. Also current and potential users of OLG will now be aware of issues ongoing and can make an educated decisions if they want to be part of that "world" or not.

__________________
Cool Viewers for Virtual Worlds: http://my.opera.com/boylane
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Gareth Nelson

Actually I haven't commented at all on being dissatisfied with how LL have responded, since so far they appear not to have done anything at all. For the record, I was pissed off at OnRez too - and that was perfectly legal, even though it was deeply unethical.

It's a fallacy to claim that I have no interest in the code (as you seem to be implying here), but more to the point it's not exactly difficult to comply with the GPL - you tar up your source tree and offer it for download. If bandwidth is an issue, you host it on somewhere like sourceforge, savannah or google code. Google code takes seconds to setup a project on - if this is so difficult to do that you have to stop working on the viewer then you shouldn't be working on it in the first place.

Ask viewer developers who also have copyright in the viewer source to act. Sadly, if nobody is willing to act then i've got no power to fix this of course - but that's life.

Gareth Nelson

You've just summarised why GPL compliance is an important matter

My emphasis - you'll note that i'm not even calling for them to be shutdown (nor would that be possible to do by filing a DMCA about the viewer). Whether or not they employ people and pay salaries is irrelevant, in your own words they have to learn to operate in a legal environment and it is appropriate to take the next step if they fail to respond to direct communication. That next step is a formal C&D or DMCA notice filed with their hosting provider. After that, the next step would be filing a lawsuit - something I do think would be utterly inappropriate at this stage.

I question the bit in bold above, considering the very slow speed at which they are responding.

Another misunderstanding that should be corrected - this is not an emergency, but it is something that should be acted on promptly, as with any license violation or other legal matter. LL are notoriously slow at responding, therefore viewer developers with a copyright in the viewer should act in their stead - as is their legal right.

Joshua Nightshade

Dude unless you're working on a project that needs code from the 3DX viewer right now this second omg people are dying the streets are running with blood!!!! then your only fight in this is the precious GPL. It's not like it's got a health meter and every day that passes without resolution is 50HP lost.

You're understating how the DMCA will affect them; repeatedly it's been used to shut down entire sites. Second Citizen was shut down for a whole day because someone from SLX abused the DMCA to get it turned off. It's completely possible that upon receiving a notice Cari will shoot first and who knows how that will affect him. I think that's unfair when this is over what's pretty much an irrelevant, non-mission-critical issue.

Now I absolutely agree that they need to stick to the terms of their license. I'm not saying otherwise. I don't like the GPL (exactly because of situations like this) but the terms they agreed to are the terms they agreed to. And this is for the people who hold the license to deal with. Nobody else. But I'd give a pass if you were designing a viewer or project that was relying on this and the lack of a code was inhibiting you. Otherwise, well, like I said, this is an overreaction to police the GPL in a way I really hope it was never actually intended.

Joshua Nightshade

And really, Sakai is responsible for far shittier behavior than this.

Gareth Nelson

Read again, I never said it's "ZOMG! THEY NEED TO COMPLY THIS SECOND, OTHERWISE WE'LL ALL DIE A FIERY PAINFUL DEATH BURIED IN PROPRIETARY CODE!"

I said that legal matters, and copyright infringement in particular, should be dealt with swiftly.

The ends justify the means - it won't shutdown their whole grid anyway, just the one server where that viewer is stored.

The GPL was intended to prevent sneaky tricks of exactly the kind OLG is pulling - vendor lockin and loss of control of your own hardware. I'm not as hardcore as stallman himself on this point - I don't think that "it's better not to develop the technology at all if it's not going to be free" - but I do count free software as being an important matter.

By the way, considering the lockout of other viewers on OLG, every single user of OLG is having their freedoms restricted. I know how much this kind of thing sucks as i've had to recently "bully" an embedded device manufacturer into giving me source code for the linux kernel they shipped on their device in order to debug some compatibility issues. How do you or I know there's not tons of OLG users in a similar situation?

Gareth Nelson

heh, I partly agree - but the GPL issue is my own pet peeve - GPL violators everywhere just piss me off, and I always wonder if someday i'm going to need that source code and won't have access to it.

On an off-topic note, some day you and I are going to talk on a forum somewhere and not get into a long multi-page argument