My two cents

[Michael Sherwin]

- it prevents the advance of the human kind (wrong, its goal is the opposite)
- great people in the past could not have produced their masterpieces if the GPL had existed (wrong)
- the GPL prevents the re-use of ideas (wrong)
- the GPL is another tool for big companies to lock their market (completely wrong)
- the GPL is viral, it contamines all it touches (wrong, you can use it along proprietary stuff)
- the author should not have protected his work with the GPL (Huh?)
- maybe the GPL cannot be enforced legally anyway (wrong)
- the GPL is used to fulfill dark motives (no amount of good faith can counter this argument, use it ad nauseam)
.

Since most of this list is wrong (not that people do not use these arguments, just that they are invalid arguments) I will add a few that I think are more relevant to most programmers' decision on whether to violate GPL.


1. Obeying GPL makes it harder to make the best program in the world (taking other people's code makes it easier on you, and not giving back makes it harder on them)
2. Obeying GPL makes it harder to get credit for your success (people that write their own engine from scratch [or are perceived to have done so] seem to get more public credit).
3. Obeying GPL makes it harder to turn commercial should the program turn out to be strong enough.
4. When you publish your source it is annoying to have the feeling other people are taking your ideas and giving nothing in return.

I am not claiming these are good reasons to violate GPL, but I would suggest they are probably more influential (consciously or not) on programmer decisions related to violating GPL.

I think #4 can be particularly influential, which is why I think anyone that publishes their source should be strongly respected for their contribution, independent of the conditions they put on use of their code.

-Sam

I notice that Fabien Letouzey has tried to turn commercial after publishing Fruit 2.1 under the GPL and that this attempt has apparently failed, or maybe did not yield the expected returns.

I also notice that he has almost disappeared of the field after that and has shown little interest of what happened to his own code.

I have contacted Fabien but still do not have any answer from him. I had been warned that it sometimes takes a long time for him to answer so I just hope he will answer some day.

I do not know what he thinks and do not know his motives for giving his copyright on Fruit to the FSF. I do not know why he left.

The points you have mentionned are very true and I'm wondering if he has been affected by any of them, or even all of them.

At this point I do not know. Also, I would not reveal what he thinks if he told me not to talk publicly about it.



// Christophe

I another thread someone has posted that he advised Fabien that he could not release a commercial, closed source version of Fruit. I was answering that this legal advice was wrong and that Fabien could have legally done that.

I do not know what happened, but when I submitted my post the message I was responding to had already been deleted. I can't remember the name of the poster and I'm wondering if he asked himself that his post should been removed or if something else happened. It's too bad because we have very few information about what happened to the commercial Fruit.



// Christophe

If I had released RomiChess under the GPL I might have the legal right to close the sources and go commercial, but I would never have done that. Yes, I posted that I thought that it was wrong for Fabien to have done so. A few days later I noticed that commercial Fruit was history. All I am saying is that Maybe Fabien agreed with me. Or it could just be coincidence.

I refrain to say the reason that my post was deleted.

[Marc Lacrosse]

I believe that the failure of Fruit comercial was mostly because that Fabien had no time to make this engine.

Completely false.
Fabien was absolutely full-time on Fruit when he decided to go commercial.

Also at that time was not the number one

When fruit went commercial it was number one (rybka 1 appeared two months later). It topped SSDF one month earlier. Zappa was probably stronger but it was private at that time.

and even the free version, TOGA had the same level.

And here also you are wrong. toga at that time was much weaker than Fruit.

Sorry to say that Pedro but your post is an evident example of ignorant people stating things that they do not know anything about.

Marc

[rhollay]

I another thread someone has posted that he advised Fabien that he could not release a commercial, closed source version of Fruit. I was answering that this legal advice was wrong and that Fabien could have legally done that.

I do not know what happened, but when I submitted my post the message I was responding to had already been deleted. I can't remember the name of the poster and I'm wondering if he asked himself that his post should been removed or if something else happened. It's too bad because we have very few information about what happened to the commercial Fruit.

// Christophe

IIRC, Fruit team was just about releasing a new, stronger version when Rybka suddenly appeared on the scene.
I think that the main reason commercial Fruit failed was that they couldn't keep peace with rapid progress of Rybka.
Before Rybka-era Fruit was the most promising engine with bright perspective to become No1. After premiere of Rybka all that changed...
Maybe they are brilliant programmers, but Vas is not only brilliant programmer but also an IM. And this could be an advantage...

As for releasing commercial Fruit as closed-source, IMO Fabien, the original author, could do with his own engine what he wanted. And only him.
AFAIK the only thing he couldn't do was to close the sources of the older versions which had already been released under GPL.

[Marc Lacrosse]

IIRC, Fruit team was just about releasing a new, stronger version when Rybka suddenly appeared on the scene.

This is simply another false assertion.

When rybka 1 appeared Fabien was exhausted after having fought for weeks trying
1. to find a solution for a chesssbase GUI bug (fruit did not get more than 1 Mo hash in some CB GUI version and fruit's uci parameters were not saved when changed in CB GUI).
2. to add working EGTB support .

There was no stronger version in the pipe when rybka appeared.

It's pretty boring to see so many ignorant people stating false things on a topic that they do not know.

Marc

[Marc Lacrosse]

Finally, the people who think that Zach is somehow discrediting
himself with this are insane. He may or may not be wrong, but IMHO he
has conducted himself with remarkable composure, especially for
someone only 20 years old.

I strongly support this.

Thanks for coming back anthony

(may i say I miss you so much here ? but i do not consider myself a member of this club any more in the way I was a few years ago).

Marc

[rhollay]

IIRC, Fruit team was just about releasing a new, stronger version when Rybka suddenly appeared on the scene.

This is simply another false assertion.

When rybka 1 appeared Fabien was exhausted after having fought for weeks trying
1. to find a solution for a chesssbase GUI bug (fruit did not get more than 1 Mo hash in some CB GUI version and fruit's uci parameters were not saved when changed in CB GUI).
2. to add working EGTB support .

There was no stronger version in the pipe when rybka appeared.

It's pretty boring to see so many ignorant people stating false things on a topic that they do not know.

Marc

And we are all lucky dogs to have such an entertaining, enlightened, know-all member like you...

[Marc Lacrosse]

And we are all lucky dogs to have such an entertaining, enlightened, know-all member like you...

Not know-all at all.
I just was one of the four or five Fruit team members at the time.

And you, who are/were you for knowing so well what was happening ?

[bob]

I do not follow your logic. _I_ support the GPL, because it is a legal document, backed up by force of law. Just like patent laws. Copyright laws. I simply know that I should not copy someone else's work and then claim it to be my own. That if I copy it, I should have to abide by whatever requirements he established. He might want a royalty on copies. Happens all the time. He might say "you can have it, I don't care". Also happens. Or he might say "This is GPL. Do with it as you please, but whatever you do is also constrained by the GPL."

I can't, for the life of me, see why that would be considered difficult to understand. It isn't new. And I can't for the life of me understand how someone would think it was _their_ right to do whatever they want regardless of the GPL.

[rhollay]

And we are all lucky dogs to have such an entertaining, enlightened, know-all member like you...

Not know-all at all.
I just was one of the four or five Fruit team members at the time.

And you, who are/were you for knowing so well what was happening ?

I said "IIRC". After all, a new Fruit (although open-source again) was released anyway, so it had to be "in the pipe" sometime.
In any case, I'm pretty sure that Rybka had to do with commercial Fruit failed.
But I admit, I could be wrong. Marc, I have nothing against your argumentations, just the style...

[Eizenhammer]

I said "IIRC". After all, a new Fruit (although open-source again) was released anyway, so it had to be "in the pipe" sometime.

iirc this is wrong: There was no such open source "fruit" after 2.1.
(gambitfruit was a different project, and not by Fabien, and before Ryan joined the commercial project.)
some later versions (more or less the fruits of the cooperation between Ryan and Fabien) were released as freeware, but there is a difference ...