No, but the platform is just part of the company - Trump Media & Technology Group (TMTG). In the future, TMTG intends to take on all the major tech outfits on the planet - AWS, Azure, Netflix, you name it.
It would currently appear to be, marginally, the least imaginary bit of the company, though. It kind of exists, whereas the rest seems purely aspirational.
It's "having people who understand the meaning of 'properly.'"
The number of people who understand the idea that "free OR open source code" is not equivalent to "I can take whatever source code I find anywhere and use it literally however I want" is vanishingly small, EVEN WITHIN THE IT INDUSTRY.
I mean, it presumably takes relatively little money to bring in competent lawyers to do things properly, and yet that Four Seasons Landscaping thing happened. You're not, generally, talking about someone who appears to value (or perhaps even understand) competence.
The someone also has a long history of screwing over many people he does business with, forcing them to waste time and money in court to get paid. It boggles my mind that anyone would still do business with him without having a legal team on staff.
< It takes relatively little money to bring in competent programmers to do things properly.
But even then there's much time and risk saved by using readily available solutions instead. The problem isn't basing your work on OSS, the problem is the license violation and that can easily be avoided.
Trump's whole business career has been a grift of doing things that he knows are illegal, and then dragging out court proceedings until the people he's ripping off give up.
I understand that these licenses are pretty straight forward legally when it's obvious a company is violating the terms. What I've never understood is how these can be enforced when someone puts effort into obfuscating their usage of a covered piece of code. Do the aggrieved parties have a way to request an inspection similar to that used by the Software Alliance?
Surely a judge won't make a company provide their source code in discovery unless you can provide evidence that it uses code stolen from you. I think that's what bink is getting at -- if you suspect that someone is using your stolen code but they remove any public-facing evidence that would convince a judge to have them provide the code to you, what recourse do you have?
That makes sense. I was just wondering if these licenses had provisions that would allow bypassing courts where I can imagine this type of violation would be very hard to prove. e.g.: if they were openly using another product with the same or similar license.
Everyone always has the right to sue and hope a judge agrees that an audit be performed. But commercial software organizations can do so without a rigorous process (not that that's a good thing).
The thing I don't get is that this new platform hasn't been officially released to users. Are they really required to make the source code available if it's an internal service, before the official launch?
Notwithstanding any other provision of this License, if you modify the Program, your modified version must prominently offer all users interacting with it remotely through a computer network (if your version supports such interaction) an opportunity to receive the Corresponding Source of your version by providing access to the Corresponding Source from a network server at no charge, through some standard or customary means of facilitating copying of software. This Corresponding Source shall include the Corresponding Source for any work covered by version 3 of the GNU General Public License that is incorporated pursuant to the following paragraph
Sounds to me like the 'all users interacting with it remotely through a computer network' part doesn't distinguish between an internal service and an external service. If it has users, you must comply with the license.
> Finally, it's worth noting that we could find no evidence that someone illegally broke into the website. All the evidence available on the Internet (as of 17:00 US/Eastern on Friday 2021-10-22) indicates that the site was simply deployed live early as a test, and without proper configuration (such as pre-reserving some account names). Once discovered, people merely used the site legitimately to register accounts and use its features.
I don't think the idea of a "launch" is present in either the license or copyright law; making the service available for use (which they did, inadvertently, it seems) seems to trigger the requirement.
Anyone that signed up and used the service is legally entitled to the source code, even if they are internal users. From reading the article it looks like some external users successfully signed up.
Compromise: Everyone who visited the site is given the source code, and charged with "unauthorized network access". I'm joking, but hey it could actually happen. A journalist is being threatened for right-clicking some DIVs.
I held my nose and voted "against" Trump both times. I don't like the guy. But I really don't like IP trolls. Software patents. SCO. The RIAA. "You wouldn't download a car." The aggression with which people are picking up the pitchforks over this is shocking.
It was a test. It was a mistake. People weren't supposed to see it or use it, and it's not up anymore. What damage was even done?
It leaves a foul smell around AGPL-licensed projects and Mastodon. I'm deeply discouraged from ever hosting a Mastodon instance if any changes I make to the source are going to summon a lynch mob if I haven't made them public within hours, especially if it's only a test deployment.
Even if you think Trump and his fan base are total monsters, don't go forgetting what Nietzsche said about fighting monsters.
This isn’t royalties, IP, or trolls. This is licensing and if you don’t like it you can take a hike cause licensing keeps people fair. Without it everyone could and would take everything and anything protected under copyright.
I have a right to control the works that I have made. I don’t care who you are, if you blatantly steal my work and claim it as your own you better lawyer up cause I’m coming after you! Just as any software developer would, open-source or not.
It doesn't really matter. If they are gonna run with using Mastodan when the official product launches, soon, they'll have to release the source then anyway. If they scrap using Mastodan, then nothing is lost by releasing the source.
They're a billion dollar company ran by a billionaire, they should be held to a higher standard then your average joe, since they have way more resources to do things correctly.
It had been officially released to users for a short period of time before it was taken down, as the article states. Since it was public, that public use of the code needs to be published as it was when it was public.
No. AGPL requires to provide source code only to users of the server [1]:
It requires the operator of a network server to provide the source code of the modified version running there to the users of that server.
Also, AGPL does not define a method for providing source code, be it publishing on a web server, sending by email, delivering on a floppy disk via messenger dogs or printing it on a papyrus and sending it with pigeon mail.
And lastly, you claim the service was 'officially released'. According to Trump's official statement, the official launch of a service will be in January.
Likely, the cause is simple ignorance. Modern developers of certain age just use whatever code they can fork from GitHub, think about licenses later (if ever).
As someone who doesn't jive with those politics, but I have to think though that they missed a real opportunity to just share the source. That'd be "the truth", that'd prove that social media companies aren't just hard coded to be echo chambers by some kind of evil political robot, but yet the dark patterns are hidden in code that isn't nearly so obvious. Plus it would show they weren't trying to do anything evil with the results? I don't imagine they will be making money with the tech anyway, it would probably end up being advertising?
They've already made a ton of money [1]. I'm sure there will be a few more false starts to grab some more, and then it will just end up in the grift recycling bin for reuse in 2024.
Gab also used Mastodon but they don't anymore anymore. They did run as a Mastodon instance[1], but after being blocked from most instances and even at the software level by most Mastodon apps, they stopped using Mastodon and wrote their own new backend that does not federate.
This is actually pretty disheartening honestly, being blocked by other instances is one thing, but everything else solely for political reasoning, especially F-Droid, is further evidence of diminishing integrity in this space.
you could alternately classify their reasoning as 'basic humanity' rather than political. When we are discussing the value or humanity of certain groups the discussion goes well beyond the label of 'political'
but everything else solely for basic humanity reasoning...doesn't have the same ring.
> but everything else solely for political reasoning, especially F-Droid, is further evidence of diminishing integrity in this space.
Supposedly F-Droid is 'Free software' but also violated the first freedom on how a user should user their software as they wish.
So does that mean F-Droid is NOT free software and on top of that FLOSS (Free Libre Open Source Software) Facebook, Twitter, Telegram, Mastodon or Matrix clients should also not be packaged because there are bad actors on those platforms who are harassing other users?
F-Droid's repository excludes several projects because it might cause them trouble. For example, they block forks of the Signal client that connects to Signal's servers, a violation of Signal's TOS but not F-Droid's.
Hosting projects in their repository causes work for them and they are right to exercise pragmatism in what they choose to host. There's more freedom with F-Droid than Google Play, because F-Droid allows its users to use rival repositories as well as its own.
Why? Most of the junk gab is famous for would get you banned here on HN too. Content moderation is... just content moderation. Gab has an absolute right under the first amendment to be able to speak. No one has an obligation to repeat what they say.
It's really disappointing to hear F-Droid is just as censorious as the Google Play Store. I guess I assumed they'd be beyond the politicization of Google policies.
But that's not what happened at all - you can add custom repositories to F-Droid and use them just fine, just like you can use a web browser to visit other websites. It would be more like if Google kicked them off of Blogspot but you could still use Chrome to visit their website.
Yeah. If people don't have a problem with gab being blocked on fdroid for essentially dressed-up political reasons, then they also shouldn't have a problem with the play store or apple's app store blocking stuff for political reasons.
I posted this yesterday in the Mastodon discussion, but the thread had long since lost its steam, so I'll put it here in hopes of an answer:
Are there any actively maintained Activitypub/Mastodon clients that don't integrate their own blacklists? Someone recommended Husky to me, but it's been dead for a minute.
I wasn’t aware that F-droid banned Gab. That is very disappointing. I am not sure why I need F-droid if they’re going to practice the same censorship and political bias that the walled gardens of big tech offers.
F-Droid allows you to add your own repositories! I think that's the best of both worlds - you're free to add whatever software sources you like, and F-Droid's not obligated to host content they disagree with, and it all works together nicely in one place.
i can only speak for myself but i'm always glad to support competition and open platforms and if they throw racists off their platform that's a plus for me
Many economic and software freedom related things wrong with proprietary stores or Google but that they deplatform reactionaries isn't one of them as far as i'm concerned
People have their limits. Most people aren’t absolutists, taking their philosophy to the extreme and utterly unable to make exceptions to their rules when egregious examples show up.
Turns out, most people don’t just dislike gab, they think it’s dangerous not to take action and don’t want to be on the eventual wall of people who Did Nothing when retrospection comes.
That’s not really bias, it’s called having a moral compass. You’re free to disagree with its tuning of course.
Readit News
[1] https://www.reuters.com/technology/spac-tied-trumps-new-soci...
No one's going to want to work for these folks. This has "hostile working environment" written all over it.
It takes relatively little money to bring in competent programmers to do things properly.
It's "having people who understand the meaning of 'properly.'"
The number of people who understand the idea that "free OR open source code" is not equivalent to "I can take whatever source code I find anywhere and use it literally however I want" is vanishingly small, EVEN WITHIN THE IT INDUSTRY.
Still, as a rule I don't work for governments and politicians because they are perpetrators of violence and they're mostly unpunished by society.
So, for the right price, I’m sure a lot.
However, given what has been reported about wage theft and lawsuits, whether they will pay is a whole different question.
Deleted Comment
But even then there's much time and risk saved by using readily available solutions instead. The problem isn't basing your work on OSS, the problem is the license violation and that can easily be avoided.
And easily cured. What secret sauce could there possibly be in their modifications that early on?
Deleted Comment
Why would he change now?
Yes. That's what the legal discovery process is for.
Everyone always has the right to sue and hope a judge agrees that an audit be performed. But commercial software organizations can do so without a rigorous process (not that that's a good thing).
Notwithstanding any other provision of this License, if you modify the Program, your modified version must prominently offer all users interacting with it remotely through a computer network (if your version supports such interaction) an opportunity to receive the Corresponding Source of your version by providing access to the Corresponding Source from a network server at no charge, through some standard or customary means of facilitating copying of software. This Corresponding Source shall include the Corresponding Source for any work covered by version 3 of the GNU General Public License that is incorporated pursuant to the following paragraph
Sounds to me like the 'all users interacting with it remotely through a computer network' part doesn't distinguish between an internal service and an external service. If it has users, you must comply with the license.
I'm not a lawyer, this isn't legal advice.
> Finally, it's worth noting that we could find no evidence that someone illegally broke into the website. All the evidence available on the Internet (as of 17:00 US/Eastern on Friday 2021-10-22) indicates that the site was simply deployed live early as a test, and without proper configuration (such as pre-reserving some account names). Once discovered, people merely used the site legitimately to register accounts and use its features.
I don't think the idea of a "launch" is present in either the license or copyright law; making the service available for use (which they did, inadvertently, it seems) seems to trigger the requirement.
Launch and release has no legal meaning, gmail was in beta for years. What matters is who can access it?
Does a non-user of a services have the right to request for the source under the current AGPL 3 legal framework?
"It requires the operator of a network server to provide the source code of the modified version running there to the users of that server."
[1]: https://www.gnu.org/licenses/agpl-3.0.html
Deleted Comment
I held my nose and voted "against" Trump both times. I don't like the guy. But I really don't like IP trolls. Software patents. SCO. The RIAA. "You wouldn't download a car." The aggression with which people are picking up the pitchforks over this is shocking.
It was a test. It was a mistake. People weren't supposed to see it or use it, and it's not up anymore. What damage was even done?
It leaves a foul smell around AGPL-licensed projects and Mastodon. I'm deeply discouraged from ever hosting a Mastodon instance if any changes I make to the source are going to summon a lynch mob if I haven't made them public within hours, especially if it's only a test deployment.
Even if you think Trump and his fan base are total monsters, don't go forgetting what Nietzsche said about fighting monsters.
I have a right to control the works that I have made. I don’t care who you are, if you blatantly steal my work and claim it as your own you better lawyer up cause I’m coming after you! Just as any software developer would, open-source or not.
They're a billion dollar company ran by a billionaire, they should be held to a higher standard then your average joe, since they have way more resources to do things correctly.
It requires the operator of a network server to provide the source code of the modified version running there to the users of that server.
Also, AGPL does not define a method for providing source code, be it publishing on a web server, sending by email, delivering on a floppy disk via messenger dogs or printing it on a papyrus and sending it with pigeon mail.
And lastly, you claim the service was 'officially released'. According to Trump's official statement, the official launch of a service will be in January.
[1]: https://www.gnu.org/licenses/agpl-3.0.html
Deleted Comment
[1] https://www.reuters.com/technology/spac-tied-trumps-new-soci...
Gab has also been banned from Fdroid[2].
[1] https://www.theverge.com/2019/7/12/20691957/mastodon-decentr...
[2] https://reclaimthenet.org/f-droid-bans-gab-app/
but everything else solely for basic humanity reasoning...doesn't have the same ring.
Supposedly F-Droid is 'Free software' but also violated the first freedom on how a user should user their software as they wish.
So does that mean F-Droid is NOT free software and on top of that FLOSS (Free Libre Open Source Software) Facebook, Twitter, Telegram, Mastodon or Matrix clients should also not be packaged because there are bad actors on those platforms who are harassing other users?
Oh dear.
Hosting projects in their repository causes work for them and they are right to exercise pragmatism in what they choose to host. There's more freedom with F-Droid than Google Play, because F-Droid allows its users to use rival repositories as well as its own.
Is that wrong?
Are there any actively maintained Activitypub/Mastodon clients that don't integrate their own blacklists? Someone recommended Husky to me, but it's been dead for a minute.
i can only speak for myself but i'm always glad to support competition and open platforms and if they throw racists off their platform that's a plus for me
Many economic and software freedom related things wrong with proprietary stores or Google but that they deplatform reactionaries isn't one of them as far as i'm concerned
People have their limits. Most people aren’t absolutists, taking their philosophy to the extreme and utterly unable to make exceptions to their rules when egregious examples show up.
Turns out, most people don’t just dislike gab, they think it’s dangerous not to take action and don’t want to be on the eventual wall of people who Did Nothing when retrospection comes.
That’s not really bias, it’s called having a moral compass. You’re free to disagree with its tuning of course.
Dead Comment
If they made some changes they have to let people access their code, a git repo or a tarball, anything will do.