fern wrote:I cannot agree with you, Rolf, because your position assumes something that should be proved first: that a violation happened.
The problem is that there is no proof that will meet the standards of unreasonable people. The top programmers (in some cases the top people in the entire world of computer science) all agreed unanimously that a violation occurred but then a few people (such as you, no disrespect intended) who have no clue about computer science pretend to be superior judges of what happened.
If you look at local skirmishes such as Ireland's Catholics vs Protestants you see that when a killing takes place, it's either a senseless immoral murder, or it's justified righteous retribution and the only difference is who's side you are on and who did the killing.
So there is no standard of proof that would ever make sense to you or anyone else who is predisposed to a given belief.
Before downgrading a sentence, you must first condemn the guy.
All the discussion here has not gone beyond this last point.
It only has gone very far in the sense that some people believe that ANY use of a previous piece of code, no matter how minimal, is a show of cloning and that that use is not dissipated by the fact that NEW and BETTER code has been added.
Over the years a lot of the very best and top programs have shared and used the same ideas and yet there has been NO conflict. The Richard Lang programs for a while were more dominant that Rybka was just 3 or 4 years ago. Nobody ever made any accusations. You have to ask yourself, what is different here? The answer is so obvious that I feel I am trying to explain 2 + 2 to a child here.
You can put this into perspective simply by asking the question, why bother starting with someone else's program? Why couldn't Vas have simply started from scratch and honored the rules? Did the copying give him a huge advantage or not? If it did not give him an advantage then why did he bother? If it DID give him a big advantage then you have admit that he made a profit off of someone else's hard work.
There is something here that is rather funny. There are some here supporting both Ippo and Rybka, Some that condem both Ippo and Rybka. But Rybka condemns Ippo and Ippo thinks that Rybka is an evil capitalist and code thief. So the people you are supporting are at war with each other and apparently there is NO honor among thieves. They don't even have a consistent philosophy among themselves and they certainly don't agree with anything you have to say on this, as they are both contemptuous of anyone who would steal code (and accuse each other of it) and yet they have your loyalty and support.
The Ippo people, or at least Milos seems to be jealous and contemptuous of Junior's title and thinks that Junior should not have been shown any honor for the win. They don't respect anyone but themselves and they have the over-inflated EGO's.
If you look at the "real" authors you will see there is no such infighting among them. I'm not saying there has never been a single conflict, but in general we show great respect for each other and do not show the pettiness that is often ascribed to us. When I lost the world championship in Hong Kong as runner up I drank a beer with the winner and we are friends to this day. I have won and lost to most of them and it did not prevent our friendships. We shared program techniques and I have told people things to improve their programs as they have also done for me.
I happen to agree with you about one point. I am much less strict in my interpretation of what Plagiarism is. I don't think copying 1 line of code meets that standard but of course 1 line of code could be ridiculously trivial or pack a lot of punch. The FSF probably would not agree with on this, but I am more forgiving - the ONLY serious concern for me is the wholesale rip-off of a an entire program or major parts of it. No matter how liberal I might be about this I can tell the difference when a program plays the same moves with the same score and PV as another program and yet represents itself as an original program.
I also don't care if the author manages to find 50 or 100 ELO to add to someone else's program, it's STILL someone else's program copied without that someone else's permission. You show a general disrespect for them to not consider their feelings. Sometimes we have to sacrifice the rights of the individual for the greater good but most progressive societies recognize that this can EASILY get out of hand and it surprises me that you are so willing to go down the path of this kind of oppression. We will take it from him because he doesn't deserve it.
I don't think this is your intention, but this trait is shared with the most oppressive tyrants in history. It's the excuse used to persecute people, that they stand in the way of needs of the state and that the greater good is served by limiting the rights of the individual.
my best
to you
Fern