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Possible copyright infringement by RollApp

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Possible copyright infringement by RollApp sealed interface 05 Dec 19:20
  Possible copyright infringement by RollApp Michael Schumacher 05 Dec 19:33
sealed interface
2015-12-05 19:20:27 UTC (almost 9 years ago)

Possible copyright infringement by RollApp

The GPL v2 license, under which GIMP is licensed, states that anyone selling or redistributing GIMP must provide links to source code. RollApp is charging for a number of features within GIMP, including the ability to save files, and does not link to the source code anywhere on their website. I have contacted RollApp about this issue, and they have stated that they are not redistributing GIMP and that they have worked with GIMP developers to put GIMP on RollApp:

Hello,

Thanks for sharing your concern with us.

There are two major things related to open source applications being

available on rollApp.

First, we are not distributing or redistributing applications. We provide

a service on top of which the applications are running.

Second, to run applications on rollApp we use binaries provided by the

developers themselves. We do not modify applications in any way (in fact, that's one

of the strengths of the technology we develop).

For all of the open source applications we provide links to their

developers' web site, where one can get binaries and source should they want to do so.

We are in communication with many developers of open source applications

available on our platform, including LibreOffice, OpenOffice, GIMP and others.

None of them had any objections regarding their apps being available on

rollApp. In fact, they support the idea of bringing their apps to devices, where
they

are not normally available such as Chromebooks, iPads, and other tablets,

which is enabled by rollApp.

Thank you and have a nice day,
Dima Malenko
CTO, rollApp Inc.

I am sending this to confirm if RollApp's claims are true, as it seemed unlikely for a very Copyleft organization like GIMP to allow for it to be sold this way.

Michael Schumacher
2015-12-05 19:33:13 UTC (almost 9 years ago)

Possible copyright infringement by RollApp

On 05.12.2015 20:20, sealed interface wrote:

The GPL v2 license, under which GIMP is licensed

GNU GPL v3, at least if you are referring to recent releases.

I am sending this to confirm if RollApp's claims are true, as it seemed unlikely for a very Copyleft organization like GIMP to allow for it to be sold this way.

I'm pretty sure that GIMP would have to be distributed under the GNU AGPL in order to require anyone to release their code changes - but regardless of that, basing a paid service on it would be perfectly legal.

https://www.gnu.org/licenses/why-affero-gpl.html

One could argue that they are providing a Service as a Software Substitute, as described in

https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/who-does-that-server-really-serve.html

But as the FSF states, this is not addressed by either the GNU GPL or GNU AGPL, and probably not addressable in a Free Software license.

Maybe you can point out what exactly should be prevented, without compromising the Freedom that's promoted by Free Software?

The one part in that statement that is - IMO - not entirely true is the thing about being "in communication"; I think we basically ignore them.

Regards,
Michael
GPG: 96A8 B38A 728A 577D 724D 60E5 F855 53EC B36D 4CDD