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05/13/14, 03:43 PM | #21 |
This is one of the oldest problems in the history of developing.
Where is the line between inspired and copy? I'm very pragmatic with this. I think everyone dislikes to be copied. Even more when there is money involved (is the bread of our family as developers) But when its about a hobby...there is really a need to defend our work to the extreme? When I develop an open source, I think about doing it for the sake of everyone. Because if I did it only for me, I'll not release it So, if I do it for everyone, why not let others change and twist it so they can use ir as base to do their ideas? ....Let the best work prevail. But, yeah, the minimum is to recognize the original autor. From there I think you cannot really get upset about it You can think it like this: maybe your work (your ui in this case) is so good that maybe you could work with an library to ease the use of this kind of menu When people start copying your work its because that kind of work was needed. Its a response to a need. Maybe they could try to do their own ui, but some people just don't want to, or just don't know how. Everyone can learn and improve form others (fork). And you can improve from others too (maybe they could do some trick here and there that you can add to your own original code). When everyone can see the guts of your work, and use it, its not a good idea to go anything but open source. They will copy it likewise, and you will get mad about it. It not worth it |
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05/14/14, 01:04 AM | #22 | |||
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So I went public domain expressly to avoid any of these issues. Also because I don't care after I eventually quit ESO, so I wanted to make my stuff as open as possible. That makes me cool right? Well the people that actually care about their hobby are just as cool and just as entitled to do whatever they want with their code. It is their code after all. If writing a book is copyrightable, then code is as well. It's really the same thing. There's no grey area about it in my opinion.
So here's how copyright works in a nutshell. Anything you put down on paper, or a file, or whatnot is automatically protected by you, for you, against anyone else. Therefore, if a license is not included with an addon it is not "assumed to be MIT license". It is actually assumed to be copyrighted. All rights reserved by author. Etc. You, the evil copying jerk, can't just take it and do what you please with it. There are two cases here: wholesale copying, which seems to be what the thief did here, and derivative works, which is similar in that you start with wholesale copying and make some tweaks (be they large or small). Either way, thief is wrong and original author is right. -----
You have no argument to stand on. So there's no point in arguing your case here. Finally something I agree with you on. ---- And now I'm not so cool. Perhaps I'm a jerk, or just really invested in what I do. I may give some things away for free. But not everything. |
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05/14/14, 06:35 AM | #23 |
05/14/14, 08:27 AM | #24 | ||
Join Date: May 2014
Posts: 44
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ingeniousclown - I try to be nice to people, but neither patience or rhetoric are my best attributes. I'm not here to endlessly argue in circles on topics that are years old, or take insults from those who don't like what I have to say. I'm here to try to work together with others in an add-on development community, where we can all learn and improve ourselves, and our creations. I don't understand why people are here who don't want to help others. I don't understand a lot about people though, and I'm fine with that. I'm an IT engineer, not a therapist. |
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05/14/14, 12:08 PM | #25 |
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I would assume the TOS of this site covers the issue of the original poster and that the mod has been taken down. I don't really see an issue with copying code as long as you retask it, do something different with it. I would imagine the original poster has no issue with others generating a grid in basically the same manner, even outright copying his code as a base to start from. He likely went through many iteration before he came up with a way he was satisfied with. Copying his code saves a person the time and effort going through those iterations themselves, but he likely has no issue with that. It's using his work to compete directly with him that's his issue.
If your competitor is using you work then you can never do better than your competitor. I see no way to view that as a good thing. That's lose-lose. The only way to stop that is stop improving your own product to show they can't actually do the work, but that's a hollow victory. When they do something else with it then, to me, it's win-win. Perhaps it's a lost opportunity but even if so it's likely an opportunity you never would have pursued. Instead you have a useful product you and others can use instead of just something you woulda, shoulda, coulda, mighta done had you had the resources to do it. There's certainly exceptions. You can release an product with the intent of it forming a foundation of an entire line of products. Allowing people take the technology exposed in that initial release to head you off at the pass does no one any good. It's a fine line though. Apple certainly benefits from all the accessory makers that jumped on the band wagon. That's no detrimental. Android pushing into higher pixel densities following their lead isn't a problem. Someone releasing an iPhone with LTE before Apple is a problem. They have legal protections against that, patents, trademarks, copyrights and such. You can't call something an iPhone, you can iOS on it, some of it is a bit excessive the part preventing you producing an iPhone, even a better than Apple's, isn't silly, it's essential. I think the same can apply to mods. Hey, we converted your mod a frame work and released mods adding these features while you working on adding those features, aren't you happy. Hell no. We didn't modify your code, just replaced a few functions after you load so we can use it as a framework. No, you might as well just pasted my code into your addon for all the difference it makes. |
05/14/14, 03:51 PM | #26 |
Guys, I didn't mean to kick off something that would get this unpleasant.
I contacted nHipster to explain why I felt the situation is wrong and he agreed to pull his addon. For reference, whilst the code doesn't contain specific license terms, there is a facility to check the license type on uploading to esoui. Not sure where this is visible on download though. |
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05/14/14, 04:59 PM | #27 |
So, today a new addon is published - StatsViewer. Since I'm myself the author of a similar addon, of course I download it to see how he's done his code - perhaps I can learn a new trick or two.
Eyeing through the code I soon realize it looks awfully similar, not to my code, but to another stats addon, ShowMyStats. So I download ShowMyStats and do a diff; care to guess the results? Now I don't know if the two authors have been in contact, nor do I know if the author of ShowMyStats care, but to me that is a bit too much of a copy-paste job to not have at least some sort of acknowledgement on it. |
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05/14/14, 05:25 PM | #28 | |
Coincidence, quite a possibility. Malicious, maybe not. My suggestion: Instead of bringing it into the public eye and posting on the addon's page, maybe you could have been discreet and messaged one of them to find out whether either had a problem with it. |
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05/15/14, 12:00 AM | #29 | |
Malicious I don't know; it might be plain old ignorance, but it sure isn't coincidence. Last edited by stjobe : 05/15/14 at 12:02 AM. |
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05/15/14, 12:00 PM | #30 | |
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05/19/14, 05:40 PM | #31 | |
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It looks like it was straightforward, not misleading, and completely true. The result might cause drama, but there are two common ways of causing drama:
This clearly is in camp #1, and I have no problem with that. It's the difference from being a whistleblower, and being Glenn Beck. |
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05/20/14, 01:45 PM | #32 | |
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On a second read-through, that might not be the most graceful way to say it, but given the subject is interpersonal drama, I think I'll leave it. |
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ESOUI » Developer Discussions » General Authoring Discussion » Add-on code - the grey line of "based on" |
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