Honey co-founder's Pie Adblock called out for copying GPL'd uBlock Origin files Closed-source browser extension Pie Adblock was this week accused of copying code and text from rival uBlock Origin in violation of the latter's software license – the GNU GPL version 3. Since that claim was made and The Register inquired about the matter, Pie Adblock's maker published materials in the past few hours that are …
I don't think they will face any penalties. While theoretically they could be sued for not releasing or acknowledging, and the developers of the code concerned could try to get punitive damages assessed, that is a lot of work that they will probably not go to. As for why they didn't just release the code as they were supposed to in the first place, I imagine it's a combination of laziness and not wanting people to point out that they didn't write a substantial part of their plugin. As with many such cases, they didn't get to hide that and probably would have gotten less attention if they published that and hid it, but the negative attention probably wouldn't harm them. While they are in the wrong, I wouldn't expect anything interesting to happen as a result.
The 4 billion was for the honey browser extension, not the adblocker.
If the honey extension infringes copyright, the copyright holder(s) would be better off going after the current distributor in the case that the license is GPLv3-or-later and such freedoms are not being shared with the users.
If the copyright holders are after money, then would have grounds to sue both the buyer and the seller (the buyer might choose to cease their definitely done unknowingly infringement and demand back the 4 billion if the contract required all copyright on the software previously held by the seller or under a weak license (especially so if they haven't and will never make a substantial fraction of the 4 billion back)).
Too bad none of the other files note if they are GPLv3-only or GPLv3-or-later and I can't find a comment that notes what license such other files are.
The adguard extension appears to be the same.
The GPLv3 is a free software license; https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.en.html
>Closed-source browser extension Pie Adblock
The relevant term is "Copyright infringing".
>Pie Adblock's maker published materials
Reviewing the repository, what has been published is not the source code.
There are no copyright headers (they appear to have been removed) or any clear indication as to the copyright holders - there is only a link to some github repos in the README.
The installation information as to how to replace the GPLv3 software in the extension has not been provided either (it appears that the entire extension could be a derivative work and therefore the whole lot must be published under the same or a compatible license).
>without meeting the GPL's requirements – such as stating who owns the copyright on those components and how they can be obtained
Copyright is held and not owned, otherwise it would never expire - the GPLv3 writes "copyright holder" for that very reason; https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-3.0.html
Merely that is is not what the GPLv3 requires for;
"5. Conveying Modified Source Versions.
You may convey a work based on the Program, or the modifications to produce it from the Program, in the form of source code under the terms of section 4, provided that you also meet all of these conditions:
a) The work must carry prominent notices stating that you modified it, and giving a relevant date.
b) The work must carry prominent notices stating that it is released under this License and any conditions added under section 7. This requirement modifies the requirement in section 4 to “keep intact all notices”.
c) You must license the entire work, as a whole, under this License to anyone who comes into possession of a copy. This License will therefore apply, along with any applicable section 7 additional terms, to the whole of the work, and all its parts, regardless of how they are packaged. This License gives no permission to license the work in any other way, but it does not invalidate such permission if you have separately received it."
It appears sections 5a, 5b and 5c are not being followed.
"6. Conveying Non-Source Forms." lists the limited permitted ways to offer the source code if conveying object code.
>The company's terms of service also impose various limitations that appear to be incompatible with GPL freedoms. For example, users may not "duplicate, decompile, reverse engineer, disassemble or decode the services (including any underlying idea or algorithm), or attempt to do any of the same."
"8. Termination.
You may not propagate or modify a covered work except as expressly provided under this License. Any attempt otherwise to propagate or modify it is void, and will automatically terminate your rights under this License (including any patent licenses granted under the third paragraph of section 11)."
Also; "All other non-permissive additional terms are considered “further restrictions” within the meaning of section 10. If the Program as you received it, or any part of it, contains a notice stating that it is governed by this License along with a term that is a further restriction, you may remove that term."
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I happily abandon carts, as on many sites it is only by starting the checkout process do you actually get to see the real delivered costs ie. Price Inclusive of shipping and duties.
It is one of the nice things about PayPal, I can commit to buy at the checkout and then (in PayPal) decline to authorise the payment.
So if businesses really want to reduce cart abandonment, it is largely in their own power to do so….
This.
So very much this.
Far too often an online vendor will obfuscate about the price of delivery in their help pages. So when you go to buy, well that's when you learn that shipping will hit you for more than the thing you're buying. Sod that.
Or my other favourite - American websites that ask for your shipping country, and then completely fail because your postal code doesn't match the town, it turns out that they're expecting a US town to match up with a zip code and fuck the rest of the world (even when, you know, you pick France as a destination).
No sympathy - most shopping failures I've come across that have led to me abandoning my "cart" have been self owns.
Or they pop up a captcha, at which point I go elsewhere.
Why do people make it so god damned hard to give them your money?
And then whine nobody gives them money?
This is why Amazon is steamrolling everyone despite being massive assholes. They make it a greased slide from picking what you want to clicking "pay"
I only heard about Honey from the Legal Eagle video a day or so ago; he does at least explain it all.
The fact that I had no idea about this "well known" coupon slinger clearly means that I am not spending enough time on The Web, learning about Bad Players in order to protect my peeps from them.
At least, that is going to be my excuse this January.
There will be other lawsuits because that's not all they did.
I would not be surprised if their checkout jacker also inserts an affiliate code even for people who didn't come in through an affiliate link. If so, they're stealing from online stores.
And users of honey are being stiffed by a product that claimed to find the best discount codes and actively suppressed them as part of their shakedown service to compliant online stores for a cut of the transaction.
So they were stiffing everyone in different jurisdictions. I expect they will have a lot of legal issues. I also hope that PayPal as the owner of this brand sees some push back, if certain online stores make the "strategic" decision to drop their asses from the checkout process and be done with them.
One simple answer to this is for all effected websites to deny any affiliate links that are connected with PayPal
That should reduce the value of their 4 billion investment quite quickly
PayPal was a shitty company at its inception and one that I will never have any dealings with. Clearly not much has changed
That is because its predecessor AdBlock Plus went from blocking ads to shaking down advertisers for $$$ to allow their "curated" ads through. Users had a big problem with that and so uBlock Origin took over.
This Pie Adblock could be benign but given its Honey roots it could be another shake down attempt to let advertisers pay to be let through or to infiltrate the browser and do other shitty and underhanded operations. I certainly wouldn't trust it enough to install it and find out.
I tried honey once, many years ago... the amount of money it saved me... zero. It never once found anything to save me a penny.
I thought it was a scam back then and removed it entirely... turns out... I was right. It was a scam, hijacking affiliate links and replacing it with their own to syphon of money from those very people promoting it.
I agree that Paypal gives off bad vibes, but, some vendors will only accept payment via Paypal.
I buy cubic zirconia from time to time and most vendors I deal with will only take Paypal payments. So to get the stones I am forced to hold my nose and use Paypal. It does not sit well with me though.
Yes, I love admin too. Why have a credit card that takes the risk for you when you can have multiple pre-paid cards and manage getting money into them as well as managing your credit card and debit card. Yes, take that internet! I can make my life unnecesarily complex and awkward on my own!!
You'll learn about awkward, hassle and admin when your credit card card gets stolen, your account is drained up to its limit and you now have to replace all the subscriptions, plough through the payments to identify the dodgy ones (not helped by the habit of vendors to use often rather obscure references) and generally need to put in a lot of work while arguing with the bank that it really wasn't you who spent it - usually that is easily explained by geographic distances but if the spending was local it can get challenging.
As for managing putting money into them, where I live we have this shockingly innovate process called standing orders (which, as a side effect, also ensures a degree of budget restriction), but given your statement I assume adding up is kinda hard for you..
Good luck with Honey to get any social media influencers to push anything associated with them again now they have been shown to be stealing their affiliate links.
Its a shame its took til now for this story to break, as LTT knew about it years ago and stopped promoting them because of it, but never came out themselves to break the story.
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