Gnash isn't original [LWN.net]

Gnash isn't original

Posted Jan 12, 2006 9:30 UTC (Thu) by duck (guest, #4444)
In reply to: Gnash isn't original by elanthis
Parent article: Flash players for Linux

Can somebody confirm that? It it really true the FSF just relicensed
Public Domain Code and announced this as a new project? Without mentioning
the origin of the code?
If this is true, this would be _heavy_ blow to the reputation of the FSF,
at least for me. It is not the question whether this is legal (which it
probably is), but claiming responsibility for other people's work is it
is like spitting on your own ideals...

How much deeper can you sink....

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Wait wait wait - what happened here?

Posted Jan 12, 2006 9:43 UTC (Thu) by coriordan (guest, #7544) [Link]

I can confirm it: yes, Gnash is relicensed public domain code.

I know this because FSF publicly say so. It's the very first sentence of the Gnash homepage on www.gnu.org.

No, FSF are not claiming responsibility for other people's work.

And, FSF have stated that they will put code that would be re-usable by the GameSWF project into the public domain.

What FSF has done is to fork a project which was not making a browser plug-in flash player, and used the code to launch a project that will make a browser plug-in flash player. To do this they will use the license which they think is most likely to bring them to this goal: The GNU GPL.

Wait wait wait - what happened here?

Posted Jan 12, 2006 10:18 UTC (Thu) by duck (guest, #4444) [Link]

I am sorry, I was a bit to fast and did not check the facts.

> I can confirm it: yes, Gnash is relicensed public domain code.
> I know this because FSF publicly say so. It's the very first sentence of
> the Gnash homepage on www.gnu.org.

The homepage indeed starts with saying that gnash is based on GamesSWF,
but I still would have appreciated something like "it is based on the
public domain software GamesSWF (link)". Maybe it is just me, but reading
something like "based on XYZ" on a GNU page, I assume that GamesSWF is
another, older FSF project.

> No, FSF are not claiming responsibility for other people's work

I apologize for suggesting otherwise, but a "Credits section" on the
homepage would have been appropriate and avoid confusion. I found the
information
in the HTML manual ("Authors").

> FSF have stated that they will put code that would be re-usable by the
> GameSWF project into the public domain.

This statement I could not find on the homepage, but I welcome this
statement. It would be nice to find it on the gnash homepage.

I am sorry for being sloppy while checking the facts and getting them
wrong.

Wait wait wait - what happened here?

Posted Jan 12, 2006 10:36 UTC (Thu) by coriordan (guest, #7544) [Link]

Everyone makes mistakes. Some of the info I got was from the announcement email (which pre-dates the press release) at: http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/gnash/2005-12/msg00000.html where John Gilmore says "Gnash is based on the excellent work done on the public domain program 'GameSWF' ... New code for Gnash will be licensed under the GPL (version 2 or better). I'm sure we can contribute public domain bug fixes back to GameSWF, though our major development will be GPL licensed."

There is also some info in the Wikipeida article about Gnash.

Wait wait wait - what happened here?

Posted Jan 12, 2006 10:53 UTC (Thu) by coriordan (guest, #7544) [Link]

To that first sentence, I should have noted "especially at this time of the morning" :-)