GPL infringement

[fern]

As I have seen in the almost unfinishable thread about Vas supposed robbery of the bank, those pals that critizices him argue esentially that he broke the GPL stuff, one that order to anyone using even a line of it to make public his own implementations, variations, modifications, etc of it.
Is it so?
It is. So any GPL agreement say. But then we can go further and make another, "common sense" question:

Is the breaking of the GPL agreement affecting an esential part of the AI of the engine?

I ask this because, and I beg my pardon to the legal puritans here, if it is not so, if the GPL break involves just some lateral parts of the engine, some subsidiary parts, etc, BUT NOT the core of it, his tremendous chess intelligence, then I would say that even if these persons are right, they are right about peanuts.
PEANUTS: trivia, details, low level stuff....
Look at it from this side:
Vas could not create his engine as it is WITHOUT the parts he supposedly stole?
I believe he was capable the same. So if He used this or that programming tool at hand that was protected, he perhaps he should not. but then can guess he could use some other tool. Would'nt he obtain the same result? Was Vas inxcapable of creating an engine with such AI without making use of this or that subsidiary tool?

If it is so, then you have a case. If not, then you have dry peanuts and a bad placed rage and obfuscation.

My best to all
Fern

[chrisw]

As I have seen in the almost unfinishable thread about Vas supposed robbery of the bank, those pals that critizices him argue esentially that he broke the GPL stuff, one that order to anyone using even a line of it to make public his own implementations, variations, modifications, etc of it.
Is it so?
It is. So any GPL agreement say. But then we can go further and make another, "common sense" question:

Is the breaking of the GPL agreement affecting an esential part of the AI of the engine?

I ask this because, and I beg my pardon to the legal puritans here, if it is not so, if the GPL break involves just some lateral parts of the engine, some subsidiary parts, etc, BUT NOT the core of it, his tremendous chess intelligence, then I would say that even if these persons are right, they are right about peanuts.
PEANUTS: trivia, details, low level stuff....
Look at it from this side:
Vas could not create his engine as it is WITHOUT the parts he supposedly stole?
I believe he was capable the same. So if He used this or that programming tool at hand that was protected, he perhaps he should not. but then can guess he could use some other tool. Would'nt he obtain the same result? Was Vas inxcapable of creating an engine with such AI without making use of this or that subsidiary tool?

If it is so, then you have a case. If not, then you have dry peanuts and a bad placed rage and obfuscation.

My best to all
Fern

Another way to see it, *if* the GPL is breached in some trivial non-AI aspect, is to ask the question "who is damaged by the breach?" and "quantify the damages".

Quantification = $0, because the program is not subject to any royalties anyway.

Who is damaged? Nobody and by amount $0

So what would be the point of a court case? Who would bring one? Which, in itself, calls into question the value of the GPL. With apologies to Norm if he thinks that was too lawyer-like

[ilari]

Another way to see it, *if* the GPL is breached in some trivial non-AI aspect, is to ask the question "who is damaged by the breach?" and "quantify the damages".

Quantification = $0, because the program is not subject to any royalties anyway.

Who is damaged? Nobody and by amount $0

So what would be the point of a court case? Who would bring one? Which, in itself, calls into question the value of the GPL. With apologies to Norm if he thinks that was too lawyer-like

It doesn't work quite like that. If there's solid proof of a breach of contract (I believe that's what a typical GPL violation is) and a request to release the code falls on deaf ears, there's always a point of a court case, no matter which part of the code was copied. Otherwise the GPL would slowly lose its meaning.

There may be no damages, and there may not even be a clear owner/author of the original work, but the case may still go to court. See GPL Violations for example. They are more than happy to fight these cases, and they've already done so: http://arstechnica.com/journals/linux.a ... in-germany

With that said, I don't think there's a case against Rybka.

[bob]

As I have seen in the almost unfinishable thread about Vas supposed robbery of the bank, those pals that critizices him argue esentially that he broke the GPL stuff, one that order to anyone using even a line of it to make public his own implementations, variations, modifications, etc of it.
Is it so?
It is. So any GPL agreement say. But then we can go further and make another, "common sense" question:

Is the breaking of the GPL agreement affecting an esential part of the AI of the engine?

I ask this because, and I beg my pardon to the legal puritans here, if it is not so, if the GPL break involves just some lateral parts of the engine, some subsidiary parts, etc, BUT NOT the core of it, his tremendous chess intelligence, then I would say that even if these persons are right, they are right about peanuts.
PEANUTS: trivia, details, low level stuff....
Look at it from this side:
Vas could not create his engine as it is WITHOUT the parts he supposedly stole?
I believe he was capable the same. So if He used this or that programming tool at hand that was protected, he perhaps he should not. but then can guess he could use some other tool. Would'nt he obtain the same result? Was Vas inxcapable of creating an engine with such AI without making use of this or that subsidiary tool?

If it is so, then you have a case. If not, then you have dry peanuts and a bad placed rage and obfuscation.

My best to all
Fern

Another way to see it, *if* the GPL is breached in some trivial non-AI aspect, is to ask the question "who is damaged by the breach?" and "quantify the damages".

Quantification = $0, because the program is not subject to any royalties anyway.

Who is damaged? Nobody and by amount $0

So what would be the point of a court case? Who would bring one? Which, in itself, calls into question the value of the GPL. With apologies to Norm if he thinks that was too lawyer-like

This is all irrelevant. The FSF has taken legal action, even when you can't prove any sort of monetary damage. I quoted the first couple of blurbs that came up on Google...

[irvstein1]

what do you think should be the end result if justice is served ? your a programmer and i know you must have a point of view on this matter .and if you have no personal opion then what are the possible outcomes ?

[bob]

what do you think should be the end result if justice is served ? your a programmer and i know you must have a point of view on this matter .and if you have no personal opion then what are the possible outcomes ?

I only want to know the truth. It would change my opinion of the program/author somewhat if the claims are true. Rybka will still be an outstanding program. There might be some issues to bring it into compliance with the GPL, such as removing any remaining code. Other than that, it is not particularly important to me what happens, how it happens or when it happens. Probably the best thing to come out of the past year or two is that copying is not acceptable, and perhaps it will tend to cut down on such stuff in the future..

[Mike S.]

(...)
Quantification = $0, because the program is not subject to any royalties anyway.

Who is damaged? Nobody and by amount $0

This is all irrelevant. The FSF has taken legal action, even when you can't prove any sort of monetary damage.

I think, the "legally most interesting" aspect is, if the other program has generated revenue by being sold. So, as a simple example (much simpler than what's being discussed) if someone would create and sell a product consisting of

- chess interface
- opening book
- engine (maybe integrated, IOW. hidden)

and if it turns out that he simply took an engine some else has the copyright for, without asking for permission, than by common sense it seems logical that the engine programmer would deserve to get a share of the total revenue (not only of the gain), this program has generated. No matter if the engine itself is freeware or not.

I am almost sure that this has happened before, maybe in other software areas, and sometimes resulting in law suits if it was found and proven.

I can imagine that such court cases are difficult, because the judge cannot simply accept the material he is presented with, as granted. He would need to verify that it's not faked. I guess that independant experts are required, in such cases. I think, nobody involved in this overheated discussion can be considered independant, or not prejudiced. I think it would have to be someone completely beyond the computer chess scene.

But all of that is totally speculative, as it seems that F.Letouzey is not concerned at all. Or at least, there are no public signs for it. I do not assume that the FSF would take any action unless the original programmer takes an action into this direction, somehow. But who knows. But it seems logical that he would be the first person the FSF would ask to verify the accusations.

I wonder what this whole matter, or mess, will do to computer chess as a whole. I am pessimistic and I wish all involved persons good luck. Maybe some persons who are capable of it, should start initiatives to "calm down" this debate. If not, I am afraid it could be the end of CCC, in the long run, and maybe even the end of Rybka and whatever else. We will stand in ruins and it will be too late.

[irvstein1]

you are right , but i know human nature and humans are not that far removed from cave man , they like to wear a nice suite and appear above all that. but in the end primal rage jealousy revenge are very strong emotions along with ego too much to control. so im betting on one way or another rybka will go down , they can not develope another program stronger so they will use the legal system which is stronger . but watch and see how this plays out and see if im not right .

[bob]

what do you think should be the end result if justice is served ? your a programmer and i know you must have a point of view on this matter .and if you have no personal opion then what are the possible outcomes ?

There are only two possibilities, if this proves to be true.

1. The source of Rybka has to be released (unlikely).

2. The source of Rybka will have to be completely cleaned up so that people inside the FSF verify that no GPL code remains.

I'm only interested to determine if it actually happened (copying code). I really don't care beyond that point. It is far harder to write a world-beater from scratch than to take a good program and make it even better (Toga comes to mind as one example). That's why I am interested, simply to determine which approach was used. It won't make a difference to most, but would for me.

[Alexander Schmidt]

Look, can you find Rybka 1.6.1? It is the last version before 1.0 Beta.

http://www.open-aurec.com/chesswar/Ches ... 006DSt.htm

I am sure Vas would be able to write such a strong engine that is Rybka right now without violating the GPL. The question is, how fast?

What if he would need 5 or 10 years, Shredder 16, Hiarcs, Fritz, Toga... would maybe have passed him. So if he took Fruit as a start he not just violated GPL, he harmed other programmers.