Nexuiz Founder Licenses It For Non-GPL Use 246
King InuYasha writes "Nexuiz founder Lee Vermuelen, along with several other core developers, have licensed the Nexuiz name, Nexuiz.com domain, and DarkPlaces engine to Illfonic in a deal to get Nexuiz on consoles. However, the kink is that the engine has been licensed for non-GPL usage. That is, Illfonic has no intention of contributing their code back to the main GPL Nexuiz project. As a result, Nexuiz has been forked into a new project called Xonotic. While the main Nexuiz site doesn't mention that Illfonic has no intention of contributing back, the Xonotic project FAQ explains what's going on. Additionally, the Xonotic project states that Illfonic 'may be in violation of the GPL as most contributors to the Nexuiz codebase have not relicensed their work for inclusion in a closed-source project.'"
Interested in seeing where this goes (Score:2, Interesting)
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Yup, grab your popcorn folks, this one will be interesting.
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Would that be GPL popcorn or the re-licensed popcorn?
(See above conversation thread if this zips by you.)
Re:Interested in seeing where this goes (Score:4, Funny)
GPL exists to encourage code re-use, so the obvious, and unfortunate, conclusion of this line of thought involves one cup and 2 girls.
Freedom (Score:5, Insightful)
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Leaches? They're like a percolating liquid flowing through the GPL code and dissolving bits and pieces of it to carry away (and possibly pollute the surrounding code environment)?
Or did you mean the parasites?
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It really depends on who owns the license. If it is GPL'd by the contributor then it's within their rights to restrict usage. If on the other hand they signed ownership over to another copyright holder then it's not something one can fight really. They should have kept ownership and in turn their absolute control over the source. I might be wrong, IANAL. All I know is it depends on the owner, defined in the license. Assignment of ownership is, rightly, up to the owner.
http://www.oss-watch.ac.uk/resources/ip [oss-watch.ac.uk]
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If you contribute to a project and sign off on the 'X Company owns this code now' statement, you know exactly what you're getting into.
If you didn't sign that statement, they probably don't own the code and they're breaking the law.
Either way, it has nothing to do with the GPL.
Re:You must have an different definition of freedo (Score:5, Funny)
And there you have it folks, tyranny is freedom! Without the freedom to establish tyranny, nobody is free.
(I know, I know - don't feed the BSD trolling)
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Re:You must have an different definition of freedo (Score:5, Informative)
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But Mozilla "owns" the source code. They request contributions of code be signed over to them to be in the official tree... that way they can legally prove they "own" every line, and can adjust the license at will. Each contributor gets the choice UP FRONT to agree or not to sign off to Mozilla.
This is the same problem the Linux Kernel has moving from GPL2 to GPL3. Linus specifically didn't include an "or later version" clause, and some contributors are even DEAD. There's no way to change the license...
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YesIAmAScript is picking with the GPL is that you are denied the freedom to keep derivatives closed-source.
If you distribute your derivatives under a closed-source license, you limit my freedom to study and modify the code you have written. Hence, I have less freedom than under the GPL.
Re:You must have an different definition of freedo (Score:4, Insightful)
You have less freedom under the GPL to do what you want with code. And you gain the ability to tell others what they can do with the code under the GPL.
Neither of these is a proper subset of the other, so it's difficult to say you have "less freedom than under the GPL".
My point was the author of the comment called the GPL license a Freedom (italics theirs) and it is not a license of freedom, like all licenses, it's a license of restrictions.
The GPL is only a freedom license when compared to closed-source license. Compared to other, freer licenses, it's really concerned about creating a commons than it is about freedom.
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Re:You must have an different definition of freedo (Score:4, Insightful)
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I believe he's using the conventional definition [freedomdefined.org] of freedom. I don't know what definition you're using...
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That's not the conventional definition of freedom. That page attempts to define "free works", which is not the same as "freedom".
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*ALL* freedom comes with restrictions. Sorry, that's a part of the nature of the universe. You can't even explicitly define a freedom that doesn't have restrictions.
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> You can't even explicitly define a freedom that doesn't have restrictions.
for software, that's contributing code to the public domain.
Re:You must have an different definition of freedo (Score:4, Insightful)
One different than the one I do. Because your freedom seems to come with restrictions.
Freedom always comes with restrictions if it is just and equal, because your freedom to do something often implies a restriction or cost for me. The GPL ensures that all the contributors have a common set of freedoms, but those translate into restrictions as well.
The Apache and BSD licenses ensure that all the contributors have a different set of freedoms, and a different set of limitations placed on them.
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One different than the one I do. Because your freedom seems to come with restrictions.
Freedom always comes with restrictions if it is just and equal, because your freedom to do something often implies a restriction or cost for me. The GPL ensures that all the contributors have a common set of freedoms, but those translate into restrictions as well.
The Apache and BSD licenses ensure that all the contributors have a different set of freedoms, and a different set of limitations placed on them.
Explain. All people involved in an Apache or BSD licensed project have the same rights and freedoms.
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Explain. All people involved in an Apache or BSD licensed project have the same rights and freedoms.
Oh, come on, does one have to be completely unambiguous here? Are you just not using context when you're reading at all? Let me try to clarify:
The point is that GP
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To be completely free is to be a slave to one's own temptations. Likewise, to protect the freedom of the community, restrictions are voluntarily accepted by participants. Similar to how you may want to stab people, but get together with a bunch of other people and make it illegal since you don't want to get stabbed.
That said, I personally wouldn't use the term "free" to describe the GPL. It seems to me more like a self-interested unit for the benefit of its members. If you work at a for-profit, you can gene
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All freedom comes with one crucial restriction: you cannot use your freedom to take away someone else's.
Ironic, isn't it? But not invalid.
In the specific case of the GPL, it grants everyone the freedom to copy the modify the software, so long as you do it in such a way that it doesn't take away someone else's right to do the same. The BSD license however, gives you the ability to copy and modify the software, and the ability to forbid someone else from doing the same thing. Is that more free or less free
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Because your freedom seems to come with restrictions.
Tell me about this land that you come from.
It would appear to be a place without laws.
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But I accept certain restrictions on my freedom in order to maintain freedom for others; this is part of the social contract. What this argument boils down to is what level of restrictions we'll accept in order to maintain a common baseline threshold of freedom for each individual.
It seems parent to your post believes restriction of individual freedom, even if it serves to preserve indi
Re:You must have an different definition of freedo (Score:5, Insightful)
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You are confusing freedom and sovereignty, as no doubt are others in this discussion.
Wait a minute. I thought this was an anarcho-syndicalist commune!
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"If I invite someone into my house I don't expect them to sell your stuff."
That's a terrible analogy. They are only selling copies and derivative works of my stuff.
Anyway, I was merely trying to point out how the poster used the term Freedom incorrectly. The rest of it isn't worth arguing really. The author of code has the right to dual-license it under the GPL. If they are changing the license on code they didn't write also, then it's a GPL violation and they'll have to stop. Because the GPL doesn't give y
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We can argue about degrees of freeness, but the fact that there were debates about the use of drivers (wireless I think), from BSD into Linux, I think it is fair to say there are restrictions implied in BSD too.
Note, I think it is 100% fair to say that BSD is more free for the recipient than GPL.
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We can argue about degrees of freeness, but the fact that there were debates about the use of drivers (wireless I think), from BSD into Linux, I think it is fair to say there are restrictions implied in BSD too.
Note, I think it is 100% fair to say that BSD is more free for the recipient than GPL.
Right, BSD licensing does not give the freedom to license BSD code under a different license just because you make modifications to it. No license allows that, so you can't really call it a restriction. You can license your own modifications under any license you like however, unlike the GPL.
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Now I don't know if 'freedom' is shorthand f
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You're right. Only BSD-style "do what you like, but don't sue us" licenses mean true freedom
No, they do not. When someone takes code licensed under the BSD license and distributes it binary only, they limit everybody else's freedom to study, modify, enhance, and interoperate with that code. That is less freedom than under the GPL, not more.
If you want to be safe (Score:2)
If you want to be safe, don't use GPL license for your software, you're going to have to deal with a bunch of pains in the asses in the future if you ever want to do anything different from a license perspective.
But if you have copyright assignments from all contributors, it's still perfectly safe to use code in a non-GPL program because you own the copyright. FSF demands such "contributor agreements" because it sometimes revises the licensing policy for particular programs.
So here's what you probably meant: If you want to be safe, don't use GPL code written by others in software that you may want to take proprietary. Instead, make sure you either own the copyright or have a fairly permissive license (e.g. BSD,
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The GPL has an anti-DRM provision which basically says "If you use GPL'd code for DRM, the DMCA doesn't apply to it." In other words, if DRM is developed under the GPL, said DRM may be legally worked around or bypassed.
IANAL. I have no idea if that particular provision actually has any legal force (and if it doesn't then the last sentence of the last paragraph is wrong).
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It's a licensing restriction. And it's perfectly allowable and enforceable.
If you choose to use the code, you may use DRM in your binaries, so long as you abide by the other terms of the license- which includes not using the DMCA against efforts to reverse engineer and remove your DRM. If you choose to use the DMCA, you're NOT licensed to make derivative works or publish complete copies of the licensed work.
It's yet another item you agree to for the typical royalty "payment" required in these transactions
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That would be GPLv3. The this-is-not-DRM-in-the-sense-of-the-WIPO-treaty clause wasn't present in v2.
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Do youself a favor and use a license for your code that actually does have an open spirit rather than a built in virus.
Exactly! If this project had only been BSD licensed, the developer could have just walked away with the code and never contributed anything back. Or heck - anyone could. Businesses should take note. Develop with BSD licenses so your competitors get your work for free! That's obviously the best way to do things and avoids all this "virus" GPL stuff.
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Yep, that is exactly true, and you're a dumbass for thinking thats a bad thing.
Do you realize that the IP stack in systems we use today are ALL based on BSD licen
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If that were wholly the case, then why is *BSD not *THE* OS out there used in everything from routers to mobile phones to desktops to servers?
When you simplify it to the terms you're using, things completely break down.
Some things the GPL makes sense for.
Some things BSD makes more sense.
Not everything is or HAS to be with one license.
Everyone should take some serious note here: DarkPlaces is a derivation of the original Quake GPL release with many enhancements. If it has any substantive pieces of Quake cod
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Do you realize that the IP stack in systems we use today are ALL based on BSD licensed code? The fact that the Internet works as well as it does is because people could all use a common bit of code, in their own projects, without having to turn EVERYTHING ELSE over to the public.
Yes, and GNU realized that, which is why there is the LGPL and the GPL with linking exception. And many people who license some code under the GPL also license other code under BSD or Apache.
Yep, that is exactly true, and you're a
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If you want to be 'safe' in your limited definition, simply require that all contributions that you accept into the 'primary fork' that you maintain be accompanied by a copyrights assignment to you or your company so that you can legally re-license those contributio
Copyright reassignment? (Score:2, Insightful)
As far as I know (IANAL, IAAAC) the legality of this depends largely on one thing: did the code contributors reassign their copyrights to Nexuiz / the code maintainer, or did they retain it?
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As far as I know (IANAL, IAAAC) the legality of this depends largely on one thing: did the code contributors reassign their copyrights to Nexuiz / the code maintainer, or did they retain it?
Two things: did they get copyright assignments from contributors, and did they get non-GPL licences from all the third parties involved?
What's really happening here? (Score:5, Insightful)
Without John Carmack and LordHavoc (Darkplaces engine developer) giving permission, they're in a huge mess. I wonder if they are using anything slurped up from other Quake engine projects? Even if the submitter of the code signed off, doesn't matter if they aren't the original author.
Relicensing your code is fine, doing it to others... Well, people get in trouble with that with stolen commercial code as well as GPL. It's dishonest, no matter who it's done to, if it's not done with permission (either direct from all authors or through the terms of the license), they're opening themselves for a world of hurt. And destroying their reputation, as well.
If the only thing that is truly being closed up is the interpreted gamecode and they are developing new artwork, there's nothing to see here...
Re:What's really happening here? (Score:5, Informative)
IllFonic actively promotes the GPL Nexuiz for all operating systems.
The console game code is being started fresh now that GDC is over, no GPL claims can apply to it.
Note: Nexuiz 1.0 was to be a commercial game in the first place, but was GPLed for the enjoyment of everyone, this deal pertains to the name and concept, not the community enhancements that occurred after the original release.
Re:What's really happening here? (Score:4, Interesting)
So all Quake code and community contributions have been removed?
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The quake code is available in a non-gpl distributable format, so it is not unreasonable to assume they did this correctly in that regard. Was any of the community contributed code GPL'd? If they don't throw their own GPL tag on the code when they send it back, I don't think it gets covered by GPL automatically.
Re:What's really happening here? (Score:4, Interesting)
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Without John Carmack and LordHavoc (Darkplaces engine developer) giving permission, they're in a huge mess.
LordHavoc is porting the Darkspaces engine to the PS3. I'm pretty sure that's more than enough sign that he's given permission.
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Man I wish people called me Lord Havoc in conversation. That sounds sweet as hell.
Who you calling?
Lord Havoc.
Oh my.
Seems to have both licenses. (Score:2)
Lord Havoc will help then, and agree to this.
Without John Carmack and LordHavoc (Darkplaces engine developer) giving permission, they're in a huge mess.
What? will the police storm his offices?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EwNSzoe28MQ&feature=player_embedded [youtube.com]
hehehehe...
WTF is Nexuiz? (since the submitter didn't bother (Score:5, Informative)
Nexuiz is a first-person shooter which started as a Quake modification in the summer of 2001
Open source at its worst (Score:2, Interesting)
This demonstrates an abuse of open source philosophy. It's an example of deliberately starting an open source project with no intention of keeping it open source: the intention is to milk the unpaid participation of others until the project reaches a certain critical mass - profitability - and then cordon it off. So here we have an open source project that isn't really, to go hand in hand with a "green revolution" that isn't really (because it's all just marketing)?
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It might be less evil if the founders intended to SHARE the profits with all the contributors, but Hell's not cold enough for that yet, is it?
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This demonstrates an abuse of open source philosophy. It's an example of deliberately starting an open source project with no intention of keeping it open source: the intention is to milk the unpaid participation of others until the project reaches a certain critical mass - profitability - and then cordon it off.
It really depends on how much community involvement there actually was. If it was 99% the work of the core team, and they have licenced properly upstream, then I say good luck to them. There's a bit of an absence of actual contributors complaining, as far as I can tell.
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I take it your not a fan of the apache/BSD/APSL style licenses, because they are setup to explicitly allow exactly what you claim as "milking." Also note, this is 2 different companies Illfonic, who purchased the license never open sourced anything (at least related to the current article), they just purchased a license from Nexuiz. Nexuiz has not said anything about abandoning their open source work.
This seams identical to what many opensource projects have done, from MySql to Apple and OS-x/Darwin. Wou
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I happen to be altruistic enough to think that an entire economy could be based on open source, but only if *everyone* pays it forward. It would be like an open-ended barter system where everyone gives what they're best at, with the understanding that they'll receive in return later (or earlier) some of the things they're not themselves good at. A system of unilateral rather than mutual transactions, in other words. Of course it won't work if there's even one greedy rooster in the henhouse, so for now we
Some real info: (Score:5, Informative)
There are a lot of quake game engines, most of then have a single person behind. Behind DarkPlaces is Lord Havoc.
We normally see the other route, ... a closed source game (Quake engine from Quake) open source his engine. A open source game is created from a closed source game (FreeCiv from Civ ). This route is "new", a open source game spawns a closed source game.
There has ben some discussions on the forums, but It has been mostly about the use of the name. Is like how Firefox started as Phoenix so got renamed to Firebird... (only to be renamed again to Firefox!). But this time Illfonic let the community continue using the name.. . Of course, some people really dislike the very idea :-/. To this date, not contributor has claimed steal code or something like that.
Vermeulen is a hardworking individual, and has push this game (nexuiz) for more than 9 years now (And If you have work on a open source project, you know how hard is to get people moving forward). I have only good things to say about Lord Havoc and the very high quality of his code. He control all the code of DarkPlaces to be of the best quality possible, this mean rewriting things to get to his standard of quality. Is this rewriting all code that probably has made possible to closed-source the engine.
HOW?
1) You get the original source code from the Id Software FTP, and a license for it (probably legacy, since is not for sale now).
2) You put all that code in the CVS. This code is the original, and you have a license for it.
3) Lord Havoc commit all his code changes to this CVS. Since he own his own changes (he is the author of these changes) he can do it.
4) The resulting code is both authored by Id Software and Lord Havoc.
5) This code is licensed by Lord Havoc to Illphonic (Illphonic already have a license from Id Software).
6) If theres some code from other authors, Illphonic acquire rights from these authors.
7) TADA!... you have a closed source engine you can use to create games for XBox 360 and Playstation 3 (I suppose lots of changes are needed to achieve this compatibility, but you have the basics of the engine).
The authors of a work can "relicense" his work. This why Id Software can release the quake source engine as gpl AND a different license. Lord Havoc is the same as Id Software, so is doing the exact same thing, releasing his work on a different license.
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Thanks, hope this helps clear some lunacy around the issue, and the discussion is a healty one.
I have worked for the Nexuiz project in 2002, so I know the topic :-/.
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It's definately possible to prove that ALL nonapproved contributor code was removed, but it's going to be EXTREMELY difficult (see the AT&T/BSD legal battle...). In theory possible, but I think this is going to wind up becoming a very interesting test of the GPL.
"This why Id Software can release the quake source engine as gpl AND a different license." - That's a MASSIVE difference, as the Quake source engine was developed as closed source and then later released as GPL - it's easy for iD to prove that
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"Also, what's the history regarding licensing of the content (artwork, levels, models, etc)? - These are all clearly "new" developments that have little to no traceability back to the original iD release, since the original content of Quake was NOT covered in the GPL release. Have all content contributors approved this?"
I think nothing of the original art from Quake will be in use. Its very old art, low resolution stuff, 256 colors.. you don't really want to go there. I have read that are tryiing to license
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I imagine version control would help to identify who contributed what piece of code.
Most version control systems I've used have a 'blame' command (some even have 'praise' as an alias ;-) ) that will show you who contributed each line. Every line that isn't by an author who has agreed to the new license means you have work to do - either get the author's approval, or replace the code.
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You left out:
6.5) If there's still code in there that was contributed by somebody who can't or won't allow it to go closed/proprietary, rewrite it.
They've been /.-ed (Score:2, Informative)
Uninstalled (Score:2)
As much as I love playing Nexiuz I can't really support this move. It's off my PC and will never return. I'm sure no-one really cares, but I do, and I guess that's what it's all about in the end - what I can live with.
If PS3 is closed - then DON'T RELEASE TO IT...
Back to BZFlag...
Much ado over nothing. (Score:2)
Ask Epic how Unreal Tournament 3 did. People don't seem to want the arcade style Quake/UT shooters anymore. If they want to succeed they need to update other things besides the engine... The only non-realistic online shooter that has done well at all in the past few years is Team Fortress 2. Good luck competing with that.
Re:id's code is GPL too (Score:5, Informative)
Nope, id is happy to provide commercial licenses to replace the GPL in their open source offerings: http://www.idsoftware.com/business/idtech3/ [idsoftware.com]
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Indeed. However, one wonders just what the price is for such licensing. A few years back it was still in the six figures for Q3:A. I'd say that we're probably talking 30-75k for what Illfonic would need to get signoff on from ZeniMax on the DarkPlaces pieces they've rights control over.
That's still quite a bit of scratch there- and it doesn't get into any of the rights for the contributors to the game engine. Each one would have to release/license rights accordingly to allow no GPL snags to exist for Il
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look at the post times numbnuts, this comment was posted 10 minutes before he showed up. It was me doing what all slashdotters do, speculating.
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Even if it was that, I'd love to see his signed off on license documents from iD that'd have allowed him to make Nexuiz a commercial game like is claimed on that post. If he didn't have them, he's NOT licensed to make a closed commercial game there with the codebase he's using.
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Remains to be seen. All depends on whether Illfonic has a paid-up license on the affected code that belongs to ZeniMax.
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Reading is good... (Score:4, Insightful)
Especially the part where it says they are relicensing code contributions without the consent of the contributors.
Re:Reading is good... (Score:4, Interesting)
Other stories about this have stated that contributors to the engine had to assign copyright, in which case there might not be a problem.
Most of the files in the current head of their Subversion repository have an Id Software copyright notice. The company doing the PS3 game has a license from Id, so appears to have their bases covered on that front.
Re:I hope... (Score:4, Informative)
They did not create all of this code. Darkplaces is a Quake1 derivative. They also took community contributions of code. Unless copyright was signed over they cannot keep that code.
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Ah, no it isn't. It's more like there is a group of people giving away popcorn because they believe it's important to give it away. Then a few people in the group make an arbitrary decision to start charging for the popcorn without the entire group's agreement.
If it had been a single developer who created the project and was the only one who had written any code then your analogy would be correct. It's not what has happened though.
Re:I hope... (Score:4, Insightful)
How? It is just like if someone gave away popcorn for free and they are now charging them ten cents. They were the producers, they can change the licensing terms. Anyone is free to do what the GPL allows for the GPL'd licensed source but for the non-GPL'd you follow the proprietary license.
Only for the code you own yourself. If others contributed, you have no right to relicense that part of the code - you need their agreement that you can do that.
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How? It is just like if someone gave away popcorn for free and they are now charging them ten cents. They were the producers, they can change the licensing terms.
Sure. IF they were the producers.
But what if I gave YOU butter for free, but under a license (i.e. the GPL) which improves your popcorn. And you in turn gave it away for free along with the popcorn you produced. (which is allowed).
Then you decide to start charging 10 cents for the popcorn, and are still including my butter. That's not ok. It violat
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As a person who follows gaming pretty closely, I have no idea what this is or why anyone should care.
It underscores the risk of what happens when you trust random people over the internet to have your best interest at hand. It's a lesson hard learned, never forgot.
Lets test you. (Score:2)
Open source games is the topic.
Could you list 4 open source FPS games? other than Open Arena, Alien Arena and Cube, please.
Re:Doesn't this contain Quake 3 Code? (Score:4, Informative)
Doesn't Nexuiz have code from Quake 3 when it was open sourced? Wouldn't that mean that if they close sourced the engine, id could sue them?
Id Software offers both free and non-free licensing terms for Id Tech 3. It could be the case that the non-free version of Nexuiz uses the non-free version of id Tech 3.
Id Tech 1 (Score:2)
Actually nexuiz uses darkplaces which is derived from id tech 1.
Might we both be wrong? Id Tech 1 is Doom [wikipedia.org]. Id Tech 2 is Quake and Quake II. Both have been on consoles before, under the non-free license.
Compare to Mozilla relicensing (Score:2)
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Why would id sue Illfonic when Illfonic obtained a license to the Quake1 engine?
Illfonic has obtained the rights to the Nexuiz's engine code, along with a license for the Quake1 engine. The engine has been licensed as non-GPL for Sony Playstation 3 and Microsoft Xbox 360, these are very closed platforms and the game had no chance of reaching them under GPL.
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No. This could mean two things - somebody sues and whatever games/platforms the now 'closed' engine runs becomes open source or somebody sues and EULA's/software licenses get declared non-binding.
Re:Is this legal? (Score:4, Informative)
No, that's why they also got a license to the Quake1 engine:
Illfonic has obtained the rights to the Nexuiz's engine code, along with a license for the Quake1 engine. The engine has been licensed as non-GPL for Sony Playstation 3 and Microsoft Xbox 360, these are very closed platforms and the game had no chance of reaching them under GPL.
From here [alientrap.org].
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Put another way, the engine is no more than 2% Quake1 codebase, and a vast majority of the code was written by me, especially the platform independent core portions.
Tracking down contributors when there is one primary author of the entire codebase, who knows almost every line of it by memory, is not as hard as it sounds.
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As far as the copyrights go, it's simple: unless the original author of a bit of code transferred (or was require to transfer) the copyright to the project, the original author continues to hold the copyright. GPL has nothing to do with it, that's the rules of copyright law. Consensus also has nothing to do with it, it's a decision solely in the hands of the copyright holder whether to transfer their copyright or not. So unless the Nexuiz project required copyright transfer and refused to accept contributio