Just for fun, I searched for Frank Lion's Blue Moonlight Vista theme to see if it was available on torrent sites to download. According Frank, this theme is donationware was available for free if you donate money to him for his projects. He mentioned that the theme was no longer going to be offered because of people who were abusing the system. I figured that meant people were able to download on torrent sites without having to donate to him. I found this theme on several torrent sites and tried to download it to see how easy this was.
I found that some of the sites you had to be a member so I passed. Then on a couple of sites I was welcomed to the site with a bunch of naked women and links to sex sites.
How nice to see what the people who take our themes are doing with their time. That isn't much a of a shocker. These people that are bashing me and telling me that I am contributing to the demise of open source software load my themes and distribute them without my permission are connected to the porn industry. One person tried to justify doing this by saying the GPL allows them to distribute my work. While this may be legally true (I need to read it more carefully) it does not coincide with the intent of the GPL that they so vocally claim to be defenders of. The intent is not to distribute another person's work just to spite them because you don't think their time is worth anything and you feel that you are entitled to take things for nothing.
I received an email from seme European college student who called me names and told me how his professor used me as an example of how people are going to destroy open source. Sorry Mr. European college professor, the people that destroy open source are those who take the hard work of others and attempt to render it useless. It is these people that lead to companies putting such strict and limiting restrictions on their work such as all the major software comanies like Adobe, Microsoft, and the others. Work is worth something. The idea behind open source is that it is just tha, open. It is not free of charge but freely available to look at and use for your own projects.
When people start taking that work and spitting on it because they feel they are entitled to do so, that is when open source will go down. Open source is about the ability to be creative and then do what you want with it. That could mean to charge for it or give it away for free but it is naive to think that open source is about the greater good of all mankind. There is too much money behind the giant open source corporations to be so idealistic.
That does not make them bad. Mozilla and Firefox, Ubuntu, Flock, Red Hat, Suse by Novell and so many others are using open source to give users alternatives in software. However, their goal is still to make a profit and that is good. Capitalism, while considered so evil by many, brings competition and competition leads to better products and better products lead to happier users. Some of it may be free to the users, some may not. That should be the decision of the developer and not for a group of unhappy users who don't like the developer's decision.
With that being said, I am working on updates and should have them available shortly. Major issues addressed are display issues with Mac OS and Tab Mix Plus.
Oh yeah, go see Wall-E. I thought it was pretty funny. I thought it could be Pixar's first bomb but it definitely did not come close to that. You may like other Pixar films better but you will laugh. It is worth seeing.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
8 comments:
Not sure what your trying to prove with Frank Lion's torrents. But I have to agree with him that you won't gain much respect as long as you use "others" graphics", themes, icons what have you. The work that you are layering your updates on were not created by you. You are updating those bodies of work, with no mention of their contributions which is what I think is wrong. Look, I spoke with the higher ups on the mozilla IRC and they flatly said anyone can buy your theme, and post it up if they wished. Whether out of spite, or whatever, its perfectly legal. And your correct that the GPL allows for this. I guess the point is there's no point for you to worry about pirates, torrents, etc.. as long as you work with themes for firefox. But if you want to gain some respect I suggest rewriting your desriptions on AMO giving credit to those that inspired and created your themes instead of saying my theme, my this, my that. That, in a nutshell, is probably why people will post and take your themes without paying you and they probably won't loose any sleep over it.
If you really want some respect why don't you create you own theme.. Based on the compact design of FX 3 with a dark theme. I'm using phoenity reborn and I wish their were a dark theme for this. If your could create something like this I would gladly donate to you. I don't care if you even use this guys theme.. just as long as you give him some credit. But I doubt he would let you use it for asking for money on AMO anyways. From what I gather, your not well liked amongst the developers at AMO. You would probably have to write it from scratch.. without help from the community.. That, my friend, is the price you paid when you decided to go commercial on AMO.
I was the one who posted that thing on AMO, refarding the GPL. I didn't do it to justify what people are doing with your themes. In fact, I haven't even downloaded them nor would I ever (all I ever use really is the default theme). I just thought I should make things clear since you mentioned the GPL so many times, claiming that it doesn't give people the right to steal your work. It gives them as much the right, as it gave you the right to pick up someone else's work. Fees allowed under GPL are merely distribution fees. Not royalty fees. If you really want to claim something as your own, you have to build it from scratch. Take nothing from the open source community, and give nothing back.
Hey... If i have got it right from ur site... then are you not offering even FREE updates to persons who have bought your themes???
That, my friend, is a rather over the top... Even Microsoft offers free updates!! (I gave this e.g. not because I bear a grudge against MS, but because many people consider it as a scapegoat for everything non-Open)
Thanks for the labour that must have gone into making these themes, and however unfortunate it is that i am not in a position to donate anything currently. As for the few comments, posts i came across, though i possess no knowledge or am engaged in contributing to the open source movement and the legalities ONE emphatic point I believe is plain:
WORK is WORK, and 'free' is extremely contextual, and the internet has evolved so dramatically that personal bashing and spiteful comments from those proponents, naive idealists who have nothing constructive to contribute, DOES FAR MORE DAMAGE to what THE OPEN SOURCE movement is trying to achieve.
ONCE again thanks, and KUDOS for the lovely BLACK themes. the fact that you even bother to post replies is in my personal opinion something laudable; it speaks of character as a Human being, something sorely lacking in the corporate environment and now even of the open source movement.
WORK needs be respected - whether it is Bill Gates or all these people involved in the OPS movement.
Here is GREAT WORK . PLEASE KEEP GOING. CHEERS !!
Thanks sir for your nice themas
You deserve to be paid for your work, but your choice in licensing has made redistribution legal, and there is really nothing for you to base your claim of theft off of. Next time try using a different license and then complain about theft all you want.
Well Bodizzle first of I LOVE your themes, being a Christian (born-again in 95) the more of Jesus I can get the better esp. whilst surfing the web and running into goodness knows what and attitudes.
Secondly, I did that myself not with a Firefox theme but an art and graphics program just to see if the rumors of hacks were true, they are sadly, why bother when people could use the GIMP, that's what I use and love. My sons friend downloaded one of the illegal paint programs and completely fudged his pc up. He who lives my the sword...
Thirdly I don't think there is anything wrong with donationware, it's a great idea and I think people are awful stealing these things, theft is wrong but one day they will have God to answer too! That is what the world is coming too, keep storing up treasures in heaven my friend. I feel the same about my artwork, somebody pinched a piece of a M*N group I was in, I was quite quite mad!
I think your doing wonderful work, truly excellent and I have just downloaded Ubuntu Christian Edition for my laptop so I am hoping your theme is still on the browser, best suited.
God bless you and keep up the good work, Helen - a born-again Christian who downloads only from official torrents sites and goes to those shop thingies for my music <><
As for Wall-E, I can't agree more. Together with my 5-year-old nephew I was fascinated by this Pixar's creation. I recommend Wall-E to everybody who haven't watched it yet. You may download the movie following this link
Post a Comment