Stockfish: Our lawsuit against ChessBase

[KLc]

Did anyone notice that there is “Fat Fritz 2 SE” now? https://shop.chessbase.com/en/products/fat_fritz_2. It looks like they currently aren’t allowed to sell “Fat Fritz 2” anymore, so they just rebranded it.

Does the SE stand for Stockfish Edition?

This was actually my first thought!

[Milos]

Did anyone notice that there is “Fat Fritz 2 SE” now? https://shop.chessbase.com/en/products/fat_fritz_2. It looks like they currently aren’t allowed to sell “Fat Fritz 2” anymore, so they just rebranded it.

Does the SE stand for Stockfish Edition?

This was actually my first thought!

You are all wrong, SE stands for Suckers (or Sheep) Edition .

[AdminX]

Did anyone notice that there is “Fat Fritz 2 SE” now? https://shop.chessbase.com/en/products/fat_fritz_2. It looks like they currently aren’t allowed to sell “Fat Fritz 2” anymore, so they just rebranded it.

Does the SE stand for Stockfish Edition?

This was actually my first thought!

You are all wrong, SE stands for Suckers (or Sheep) Edition .

Makes be laugh like the guy in the video on Tomasz Sobczyk Youtube channel!

[AndrewGrant]

Did anyone notice that there is “Fat Fritz 2 SE” now? https://shop.chessbase.com/en/products/fat_fritz_2. It looks like they currently aren’t allowed to sell “Fat Fritz 2” anymore, so they just rebranded it.

Does the SE stand for Stockfish Edition?

This was actually my first thought!

You are all wrong, SE stands for Suckers (or Sheep) Edition .

Makes be laugh like the guy in the video on Tomasz Sobczyk Youtube channel!

Could use an updated video at the end of it all

[Guenther]

You did not answer my question. The ICGA had at least a panel and a process.

--
Srdja

Houdini has been determined to be a clone via source code inspection, by a wide array of subject matter experts, including but not limited to: Me, Alayan, Cucumber, Rebel, Norman Schmidt, Vizvez, Terje, Connor, and more.

*smatovic* must have been sleeping, while the Houdini issue was discussed ad nauseam here.
You forgot my name and the name of team Komodo on the list above...

As a pretty reminder, here is what a 'good angel' had left @github forever to see.
( everyone can look at it and compare to the SF version of the right time in history, only intentionally blind ones
won't see the source theft)
https://github.com/crossopterygian/Houdini_6

[dkappe]

It feels like many people here dont understand the difference between whats legal and what is allowed. The legal part is decided by official courts where as what is allowed is decided by the chess community. Especially the unique engine authors, tcec etc.

According to common chess community standards, it is not allowed to:

- steal code
- not correctly credit other people if parts of it are used
- using other peoples data when training NN's
- ...

I do not care if FF is actually legal or not, all i know is what they did is not allowed by common chess community standards and they need to face the consquences for that.

- FF2 runs on a slightly modified version of SF. This can be distributed in binary form according to the GPLv3 as long as you provide the source. See github,
- Stockfish is credited prominently in the marketing copy of FF2. (I suspect they did that because Stockfish is a selling point, but that’s just a guess.) It’s on the box.
- FF2 was trained on data generated using FF1. Not hard to believe. I generated a ton of data using Bad Gyal, Toga, Ice, etc., though not nearly as much as Albert.

So there you go. Common chess community standards(tm) adhered to. You are now free to enjoy FF2 without guilt. You’re welcome.

Your post might make people think that FF1 was original in the first place.
Changing 3 lines in stockfish does not make it a new engine.
And the list i named of people in this community judging what is allowed or not ("Especially the unique engine authors, tcec etc.") did not name you...

Oh dear, so now there’s some more conditions (unspecified) about the data? And there’s a list that is “named?”

Tell you what. You have a think and when you’ve come up with a complete list of these “standards,” you get back to me.

[smatovic]

snip...

......only intentionally blind ones won't see the source theft...

That is exactly my point.

--
Srdja

[hgm]

Did anyone notice that there is “Fat Fritz 2 SE” now? https://shop.chessbase.com/en/products/fat_fritz_2. It looks like they currently aren’t allowed to sell “Fat Fritz 2” anymore, so they just rebranded it.

"Silver Edition" ?

[hgm]

- FF2 runs on a slightly modified version of SF. This can be distributed in binary form according to the GPLv3 as long as you provide the source. See github,
- Stockfish is credited prominently in the marketing copy of FF2. (I suspect they did that because Stockfish is a selling point, but that’s just a guess.) It’s on the box.
- FF2 was trained on data generated using FF1. Not hard to believe. I generated a ton of data using Bad Gyal, Toga, Ice, etc., though not nearly as much as Albert.

So there you go. Common chess community standards(tm) adhered to. You are now free to enjoy FF2 without guilt. You’re welcome.

I suppose there still are the issues of:
1) Whether a NN is a computer program, and the weights are the corresponding machine code.
2) Whether this program counts as linked with a conventional executable when the latter uses the output of the NN it interprets for further calculation
3) What would count as the 'source code' of the NN in the GPL sense.

It will be interesting what the court decides on this.

I can imagine an outcome where (1) and (2) are decided as 'yes, it does', and (3) would be the set of training positions.

[dkappe]

I suppose there still are the issues of:
1) Whether a NN is a computer program, and the weights are the corresponding machine code.
2) Whether this program counts as linked with a conventional executable when the latter uses the output of the NN it interprets for further calculation
3) What would count as the 'source code' of the NN in the GPL sense.

It will be interesting what the court decides on this.

I can imagine an outcome where (1) and (2) are decided as 'yes, it does', and (3) would be the set of training positions.

You’ve brought it back from dubious “community standard” to the legal.

I think the NN being copyrightable question would be likely to bring lots of big players running in a common law country. Also not sure what the “right” position is from a FOSS perspective.