The Dark Side of FOSS

AilliA

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Sep 17 14:17

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#102

6. Creator's Response
I discussed this perspective with others, including the original creator of the Kabus marketplace, sukunetsiz, who responded thoughtfully (quoted with permission):

Fair enough. That's probably coming from AshleyJones. Well, she may be right from the legal side, though it is saddening from the open-source perspective. I have put more than a year into this project just for the sake of open-source and Monero. I could have chosen to sell it. Maybe that was a mistake on my part to open-source it, by the logic of her words. The reason I stopped open-source development of Kabus was people like TipTony. Two other people were trying to sell the script for thousands after rebranding it.
...
If you see it as a must-do to remove the warning from his account, ... I would appreciate it if he put "This marketplace is made with Kabus" under the description of his product listing. Though I would still prefer for his account to keep being flagged with that warning, as I still see this as labor theft. It's also discouraging for developers to open-source projects. No one will probably make another open-source script after seeing how easy it is for a random guy to just rebrand it and act like it's their own.

And personally, I feel the creator's pain. As a human, I'm totally empathizing with the long hours of work being exploited and misused by freeloaders. But I'm not a human for XmrBazaar; I'll push buttons to do what the community deems right, and the Monero/XmrBazaar community believes in GPL licensing: "it’s like the Bible written by Richard Stallman".

Edited: Sep 17 14:54

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AilliA

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Sep 17 14:22

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#104

7. Advice
I asked Ashley what she would do, as I respect her experience with her portion of the web (very!) wild west, and her opinion.
Ashley replied with a "novel" and cute ASCII art, and I'll post the link here: https://dukenukemis.cool/textfile95.txt :

I know in your position, you have to make a lot of decisions daily, and surely deal with a lot of crazies.
While I don't know the exact things TipTony has done, I've made the (reasonable) assumption that he's upvoted his own listings, reviewed himself many times, trolled users in the Trollbox, spammed comments and downvotes, because the "people" who do this all have the same writing style and operate all at the same time. So I believe you when you say there's been trouble with him.
You ask -- what would I do? Personally, this is my thought process:
In this specific isolated incident, where he is listing a service that utilizes open source GPL software to install and administer on a server -- he is doing nothing wrong. He would only be doing wrong if he refuses to provide the source code with his service, as that breaks the GPL license. Aside from that, he's in the clear and hasn't "stolen" something that is licensed with GPL.
When you consider the other things he is probably doing, it may be tempting to want to penalize him for this listing, but, objectively the listing itself has not misused the code. Therefore, penalizing him for it sets a presedent for the rest of the community here. It can lead to confusion (like it did for me), or probably distrust among some users if the admin doesn't uphold the importance of GPL products. There's a lot of Linux and open source-savy people on XmrBazaar, and I feel like if they read the current warning on his account, they would be confused, as open source software almost always enables others to utilize the code how he was doing.

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AilliA

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Sep 17 14:23

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#105

(Ashley's quote continues)
So, for me personally, I would leave it. I think consistency and unbiased ruling is the right way to proceed. So whether it's me or some (probably) scummy guy hosting Kabus, it's not stealing code and it's legal.
As for moderation, I have dealt with my fair share of nutjobs in the 10 years of running imageboards. I used to try to abide by "never deleting anything" in favor of free speech. However, you will eventually run into bad apples who make a point of disrupting the flow or basic goal of the website. For example, my goal of an imageboard is to allow users to freely communicate with one another. Naturally, I wouldn't want to censor discussion. However, I have one very persistant user who always discourages people from posting, because anytime people post, he responds with insults over and over until people decide to stop posting. It works, he usually stops discussion because people get tired of being told they're stupid, shouldn't post etc., and then the imageboard is dead for weeks.
Nobody likes this behavior, it disrupts the entire point of the website (to discuss), and this individual has been warned. But warning alone didn't stop him, so I eventually resorted to deleting those posts. I ruled that it was in the community's general best interest to allow discussion without the spammy-insults that disrupted the general flow and idea of the website. Doing this drastically helped get discussion going again. And people were very understanding, "censorship" wasn't my goal. My goal was to have an imageboard where good-faith discussion could take place. Most people are sypmathetic and can spot a bad-faith person.

Edited: Sep 17 14:23

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AilliA

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Sep 17 14:25

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#106

(Ashley's quote continues)
To get around "censorship", my board has a "mod log". Anything I remove gets listed in my mod log along with the date I took this action, the reasoning, and the contents of the post if I wanted. This allows complete transparency so people can see I don't abuse power, and that any actions I take are not burried. It's out in the open for people to see.
I'm a proponent of freedom of speech too, obviously. However, imagine if a guy went to a movie theater, bought a ticket, and then in the middle of the movie got up in front of the screen and started reciting poetry in as loud a voice as he could muster. If someone did this, they'd be kicked out of the movie theater, and rightfully so. Nobody is trying to 'censor' them or stifle their freedom of speech -- but the movie theater is selling a product (an enjoyable movie-watching experience) and this person, who entered the theater voluntarily, is acting in bad faith and ruining the product for everyone else. That's a silly scenario, but this is effectively what people who act in bad faith in any kind of online community are doing. As the manager of a movie theater, or as an administrator of a website, my opinion is that you not only have a right to remove these people, but an obligation to do so. A "mod log" adds transparency, so that everyone else on the website can understand exactly why certain administrative actions were taken. Without this transparency, the guy in the example before could go around town telling everyone that the movie theater kicked him out "for no reason," when that's obviously not the case. A transparent mod log gives a community more trust in the administration, because if they DO happen to see an action taken on the mod log that they disagree with, they can voice their opinion then. In 99% of scenarios (deleting spam, banning obvious bad-faith users) the community will thank you for dealing with the problem.

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AilliA

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Sep 17 14:26

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#107

(Ashley's quote continues)
The above is my personal opinion. It can be hard balancing absolute free speech with a website that accepts user-submissions like XmrBazaar. You will get people absuing certain aspects. My advice is to remember the general goal of the website, and care and tend to the website to achieve that goal. Even in an anarchist society, there are general agreed upon ethics or order that a community agrees upon. It's a matter of balancing order with respecting people's ability to utilize the tool/platform you give them in a productive manner.
Also, you are free to use any part of the message I had sent you, thanks for asking. You can keep it anonymous or put my name on it, either way is fine. I would've put some ascii art in there if I knew it might be shown off. Better late than never:

So here I am, posting this on the public square, as a form of "mod log" for the sake of transparency, community spirit, and trust :)

Edited: Sep 17 14:29

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AilliA

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Sep 17 14:30

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#108

8. Kabus License Revision
I discussed further with sukunetsiz:

sukunetsiz: I am considering to change my license to a custom made one for a legal foundation if it is needed Sep 6, 07:48

AilliA: ...I’m truly sorry you’re having to deal with this headache at all, especially after pouring over a year of your time and passion into Kabus just for the love of open-source and Monero. That’s incredibly generous, and it’s frustrating to see ppl like Tony take advantage of that. I totally get where you’re coming from; we’ve been feeling the pressure to open-source our own code for a while now too, and situations like this make this decision even tougher.
...And honestly, I couldn’t care less about nation-state laws, they’re not real laws to me, lol. What matters is the community, trust, transparency, and apparently Monero community respects FOSS principles: it’s clear a lot of people care deeply about licenses like this. I’m really glad you’re considering updating your license, it sounds like a smart move to protect your work while keeping the spirit of open-source alive. ...if we reactivate Tony’s Kabus listings, I can add a custom admin warning to the listings saying something like “This marketplace is made with Kabus by sukunetsiz: check out the original at [GitHub and XmrBazaar links ].

sukunetsiz
...first of all I would suggest to never open-source XmrBazaar really, haha. We will see a monerobazaar the next day with a different color design :) And yes, you may write a X post about it, quote me or anything. No problem. And yes, I’m making the final changes on the new license, with also help of a lawyer friend of mine. It probably won’t mean much in an unlikely court case but at least it will be enough for DMCA takedowns. Also thank you, I would really appreciate that warning to be placed in case you will need to remove his account warning :)

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AilliA

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Sep 17 14:32

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#109

9. Purging the Bots
I announced in our trollbox:

Until we implement new systems and features to address bots, FUD, and harm to productive community members, accounts involved in such activities may be deactivated.

and enforced this part of our ToS:

NO HARM TO OTHER USERS OR TO THE PLATFORM ALLOWED: Users may not harm, threaten or harass other users. Users may not spam, scam, phish, hack or cause any other harm or inconvenience to other users or the platform. XmrBazaar can ban members at any time for any reason.

by identifying TipTony's alts/bots using data science heuristics, some of which Ashley intuited in her second message:

I've made the (reasonable) assumption that he's upvoted his own listings, reviewed himself many times, trolled users in the Trollbox, spammed comments and downvotes, because the "people" who do this all have the same writing style and operate all at the same time.

Initially, I planned to detail the data analysis methods in this (already epically long!) post, applicable even though XmrBazaar doesn’t log IPs. However, spelling out the game rules would only tip off bad actors, so I'll keep it vague. Let’s just say, with my IRL skills / qualifications, I could (in theory, because I’d rather not deal with it) serve as an expert witness in common law courts (as those statist credentials still seem to matter to some ppl). As a result, I’ve disabled the identified alt accounts and bots, except ukpost and TipTony’s main account.

Edited: Sep 17 14:34

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AilliA

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Sep 17 14:34

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#110

I wrote Ashley:

I get your point on this isolated incident with the GPL stuff, and I appreciate you laying out why penalizing just for that could confuse folks or set a weird precedent in our open-source-loving crowd. That’s why I use my twitter account like a public square: to discuss, log, and hash out these controversial situations openly with the community. It keeps things transparent and lets everyone chime in.
...Either way, we’re on the path to resolving this. Tony’s actions actually triggered some positive changes to clean up the place: we’ve already disabled the up/downvote system entirely. And sukunetsiz is considering changing their license, so we’ll handle that to the satisfaction of all the FOSS license lovers out there :)))

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AilliA

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Sep 17 14:36

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#111

10. Long Live FOSS
TipTony couldn't care less about peer-to-peer / genuine human connections: they flat-out refused to make things right with the Kabus creator, opting instead to lash out at them and other users while hiding behind the cold letter of the law and the supposed "unprovability" of their (or their alts') actions.
I genuinely believe the author, the real human who poured endless hours into their creation, should have the final say on how it's used. But those respectable XmrBazaar / Monero community members who chose to voice their opinion to me disagree and respect FOSS/GNU license, which I as not-a-human-but-as-admin will dutifully enforce :)
That said, it doesn't change the fact that TipTony is still a total PoS, who "upvoted his own listings, reviewed himself many times, trolled users in the Trollbox, spammed comments and downvotes, because the "people" who do this all have the same writing style and operate all at the same time".
Regardless: TipTony's account warning has been lifted:

The listings in question have been reinstated with links to the original creator:

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Sep 17 14:37

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#112

[Deleted by poster]

Edited: Sep 17 14:50

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Sep 17 14:38

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#113

[Deleted by poster]

Edited: Sep 17 14:49

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Sep 17 14:49

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#116

[Deleted by poster]

Edited: Sep 17 14:50

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iDrive

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Sep 17 16:45

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#118

Ok. So the way I'm seeing it is similar to AshleyJones.

On this site, many users violate the TOS of various platforms -- Amazon, Netflix, etc. It isn't illegal, but we aren't really treating their "obvious wishes" with respect. Were we stealing and reselling something from them though, that would be illegal, breaking the site's rules, and possibly bringing unwanted heat.

It seems to me that Sukenetsiz chose a form of licensing that did not actually align with his purposes. He made it legal, fully legal for TipTony to use it as he did, to my understandin. He could have protected his property by the law, but he opened it by the law. And now Sukenetsiz is technically trying to do something illegal -- violating someones rights. Even though it's property he originally designed, it's no longer in his possession, but the world's. He chose this by the license he selected.

We don't defend Amazons, EBay's, Netfix's creative freedom here, going above and beyond the law to protect their perceived IP. We push the boundaries and repurpose these products for our own grey usecases. But we still stay within the law, on this platform.

To make an extreme case: Monsanto. Monsanto created GMO corn that spreads across the world. They created those genetics. Do we defend their creative rights? No. We don't respect them. I personally think with IP that there's a limit, after which you can't reasonably expect every copy of your work to be owned by you. It's one thing to own the original Mona Lisa, another to expect to own every picture someone snaps of it.

But in this case, rather than even try to protect his work the way he intended to, he chose a structure that didn't do what he wanted. So he opened it up from the getgo,

If the mods here want to use a separate ethic to make their determinations, that's another story and I guess that's fine. But the decisions will be on a case by case basis based on feels and not applied uniformly, or we'd be defending megacorps feels too.

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iDrive

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Sep 17 16:54

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#119

I'm not that versed in GPL but I know that Creative Commons Copyleft has several types, some that require crediting the creator, some that offer free use for noncommercial use etc. It's hard to accomodate every nuance or edge scenario with a handful of rough laws. And I know we aren't necessarily a group of people who respect laws. But interpersonal agreements are still important and it seems like more well-firmed verbiage around expectations might have helped allay misunderstanding or unintended consequences. At least within this community, if not the broader world.

I've thought several times about releasing music, designs etc under the most fully open licensing. But after thinking about it more, there can be a lot of unintended consequences that AREN'T good for everyone, just because it sounds like the nice and cool thing to do.

edit: I didn't realize there was a second page of thus discussion. Some of the things I said got brought up already

Edited: Sep 17 17:03

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hedgehog

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Sep 17 17:02

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#120

Thanks AilliA for taking out the trash, doing it with considerable soul searching and grace.
Kudos to AshleyJones also, for the well reasoned advice.

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AilliA

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Sep 17 17:24

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#122

Reply to post #120

Thank you, hedgehog 🌺❤️

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