5 ms·

Why are a lot of people missing stuff like this: "have some class and use your own words and write your own book" and this "Guys like you are the reason I stopp

by sp4rki 16y ago

Why are a lot of people missing stuff like this: "have some class and use your own words and write your own book" and this "Guys like you are the reason I stopped doing Ruby"? I agree with Zed that the idea was borderline useless since both languages have their ways and a direct translation lacks focus anyway. I also agree that it's Zed's work, and he granted use of his work with a license which doesn't allow this type of derivate work. Zed was totally in the right here, and Martin was totally in the wrong. That being said, that doesn't automagically grant Zed the right to be a douche and insult the guy, specially since not only he complied with Zed's request, but tries to explain that he did so in good faith. There's no 'tone' here, it was obviously an insulting and condescending attack towards Martin. A simple "Hey what you're doing is not permitted by my license, take it down" or "You're infringing my copyright, take this down" would have been more than enough. The reality is that Zed loves to pick a fight and demean people, and in this case Martin made a mistake in good faith and did not deserve such disdain.

Semiapies 16y ago
When you act in a classless way, whether that's making fart noises in a restaurant or plagiarizing someone's work, you risk the pain of being told to act with more class.
- aplusbi 16y ago
  This wasn't plagiarism. At no point did Martin attempt to pass this off as his own work. This was an homage, very much in the spirit of open source - the only problem was that the book is not open source.
  - Semiapies 16y ago
    In that detail, it may not be the classical form of plagiarism and just piracy. However, if we are sticklers for the point of attribution, we have to acknowledge that "homage" doesn't involve ignoring licenses or copy-and-pasting the original content, now don't we?
    - aplusbi 16y ago
      Yes, he committed copyright infringement - I'm not going to argue that. I'm talking about intent - did Martin have malicious intent? I don't think so. I don't think he ignored the license - I think he assumed it was under a permissive license - a silly mistake, but since the book is "free" it's not hard to see how someone could make that mistake.
      - Semiapies 16y ago
        Please understand: when you do something wrong, when you "ignore" or "assume" away that you're doing something wrong, when you react belligerently to the person telling you to stop doing that wrong thing, your original intent just isn't that important.
        sp4rki 16y ago
        I'm sorry man but the person initially belligerent was Zed with his remarks about class and his hostile approach. Martin, complied with that Zed asked, and tried to explain his reason, his intent, and why he thought it was ok. Zed again responded in an antagonizing way. If Zed had done the things the 'classy' way, he would have either sent a Cease and Desist notice or sent a POLITE message to the person he's addressing. And for the record, intent is the only thing that actually matters in this discussion, as the only real damage that has occurred is towards Martin's reputation, which more than likely was Zed's (specially knowing his belligerent tendencies) intent.
        Semiapies 16y ago
        No. Full stop. The person wrong was Edme. The person wronged was Shaw. Absorb these facts. The person who tried to tell the person he wronged that he hadn't actually done anything wrong was Edme. The person who twittered about the person he'd wronged being a douchebag was Edme. The person who continued and escalated the confrontation, instead of apologizing, taking his lumps, and STFUing, was Edme. Absorb those facts. This story does NOT start with Shaw's first message as some sort of aggression. It starts with Edme and it continues with Edme, no matter how you try to recast it. Now, if Shaw's "tendencies" were leading him to try to ruin Edme's reputation, I think he could have accomplished that much easier by making a long blog post about how Edme is an asshole, instead of a blog post that tangentially mentioned that some unnamed people were trying to "port" his book, why that was a bad idea, and how to properly go about making a version of his book. On the other hand, Edme tried to publicize the exchange. He posted it on HN to cold disinterest and a flag-killing. If anyone was trying to hurt anyone's else's reputation, I think it was Edme himself. That Edme's reputation will probably suffer more that Shaw's is just funny.
- sp4rki 16y ago
  Two things: 1) It was not plagiarizing, it was copyright infringement, and they are both not mutually inclusive and are completely different. Martin didn't appropriate the content or idea of the book and called it his own, he publish the start of an attempt of a 'book hack' stating the original author and intent. 2) Do you equate fart noises with a person making a mistake in the name of providing something useful to the community? The dude made a mistake, a mistake that in no way reflects on his amount of class, but does reflect on his drive to provide something useful to the Open Source community. Sure he should be corrected, as he did make a mistake, but he should not be degraded in any way as has been done in this case. PD: Who has more class, the person who farts in a restaurant, or the person that calls him on it publicly without knowing the reasons for him doing it and does so with intent to degrade such person?
  - Semiapies 16y ago
    You're trying to wrap all this up in justifications of what he did this "in the name of". How someone justifies something like this is irrelevant. The basic rule for material, absent an explicit other license, is copyright. Shaw is generous enough to offer a less restrictive license, but that license is clear on its terms. To ignore the license given on a work, whether it's copyright, some CC non-commercial variant, GPL, or whatever is indeed a classless act. And if you want to linger on "providing something useful", Zed has pointed out and Martin acknowledged that this approach is not useful for advancing Ruby education. (For that matter, it was a dead project.) Shaw has now provided a guide on how to make a book of this style at http://sheddingbikes.com/posts/1288945508.html http://sheddingbikes.com/posts/1288945508.html Also, it's "make fart noises", not "fart". As in deliberately make a noise considered rude. Copying and pasting a book and putting it in a public repository isn't a semi-voluntary bodily function.
    - sp4rki 16y ago
      For starters, I'm not justifying anything Martin did, as I never said he was right in any way, don't try to put words in mouth. As a matter of fact, I agreed on the following: 1) Zed has every right to complain due to his copyright and the license which his work carries 2) What Martin did was wrong, and as such he should accept that fact that the owner disapproves and take the work down (which he did) 3) Martin violated Zed's copyright. I explicitly said that what he did was copyright infringement, which can certainly be attributed to a mistake, because you wrongly stated it was plagiarism, which is considered morally unacceptable and reprehensible, and is in no way the same thing. You want to know what IS irrelevant? The fact that Martin and Zed (and both you and me actually) both acknowledged that the approach is not useful, specially since I already stated in the grandparent post - to which you responded - that I agreed on not only Zed's rights as copyright holder, but also on the fact that the approach is rubbish. It doesn't matter whatsoever if the approach works or not, it only matters that Martin did it in good faith because he believed it could be of use when he started, even if later he discovered to be wrong on this count. I addressed your fart noises on my second point of the parent post, on the last paragraph I was referring to actual farting because it is more representative of what happened here. I referred to them separately and referred to 'farting' and 'farting noises' to make this clear (as they are obviously two different things). The fact that you equate a jerk making farting noises in a restaurant with making a mistake in regards to a free book's licensing is beyond my comprehension, as it implies that you're disagreeing with the intent of the person in question when it was already not only stated by him, but by Zed himself in his messages. Also, it's "make fart noises", not "fart". As in deliberately make a noise considered rude. You said it yourself, the key word on this example is 'deliberately'. Martin did not make deliberately farting noises (deliberately and knowingly doing copyright infringement on Zed's work), he actually farted by mistake (mistakenly having violated Zed's copyright thinking it was fair use), and because of this he should apologize to the restaurant, but such events in no way grant Zed the right to humiliate, demean, or degrade Martin. I'm not justifying Martin's actions, as I agree that he's wrong and Zed is right, I'm criticizing Zed's responses and the manner in which he expressed himself towards not only towards Martin, but towards the Ruby community itself. The funny thing is that I actually respect Zed for his contributions, and isn't someone I'll be deleting from my newsreader because of something as non-important as this. That doesn't change his attitude was reprehensible, and that he could have handled it better.

by sp4rki 16y ago

Semiapies 16y ago

When you act in a classless way, whether that's making fart noises in a restaurant or plagiarizing someone's work, you risk the pain of being told to act with more class.

aplusbi 16y ago
This wasn't plagiarism. At no point did Martin attempt to pass this off as his own work. This was an homage, very much in the spirit of open source - the only problem was that the book is not open source.
- Semiapies 16y ago
  In that detail, it may not be the classical form of plagiarism and just piracy. However, if we are sticklers for the point of attribution, we have to acknowledge that "homage" doesn't involve ignoring licenses or copy-and-pasting the original content, now don't we?
  - aplusbi 16y ago
    Yes, he committed copyright infringement - I'm not going to argue that. I'm talking about intent - did Martin have malicious intent? I don't think so. I don't think he ignored the license - I think he assumed it was under a permissive license - a silly mistake, but since the book is "free" it's not hard to see how someone could make that mistake.
    - Semiapies 16y ago
      Please understand: when you do something wrong, when you "ignore" or "assume" away that you're doing something wrong, when you react belligerently to the person telling you to stop doing that wrong thing, your original intent just isn't that important.
      - sp4rki 16y ago
        I'm sorry man but the person initially belligerent was Zed with his remarks about class and his hostile approach. Martin, complied with that Zed asked, and tried to explain his reason, his intent, and why he thought it was ok. Zed again responded in an antagonizing way. If Zed had done the things the 'classy' way, he would have either sent a Cease and Desist notice or sent a POLITE message to the person he's addressing. And for the record, intent is the only thing that actually matters in this discussion, as the only real damage that has occurred is towards Martin's reputation, which more than likely was Zed's (specially knowing his belligerent tendencies) intent.
        Semiapies 16y ago
        No. Full stop. The person wrong was Edme. The person wronged was Shaw. Absorb these facts. The person who tried to tell the person he wronged that he hadn't actually done anything wrong was Edme. The person who twittered about the person he'd wronged being a douchebag was Edme. The person who continued and escalated the confrontation, instead of apologizing, taking his lumps, and STFUing, was Edme. Absorb those facts. This story does NOT start with Shaw's first message as some sort of aggression. It starts with Edme and it continues with Edme, no matter how you try to recast it. Now, if Shaw's "tendencies" were leading him to try to ruin Edme's reputation, I think he could have accomplished that much easier by making a long blog post about how Edme is an asshole, instead of a blog post that tangentially mentioned that some unnamed people were trying to "port" his book, why that was a bad idea, and how to properly go about making a version of his book. On the other hand, Edme tried to publicize the exchange. He posted it on HN to cold disinterest and a flag-killing. If anyone was trying to hurt anyone's else's reputation, I think it was Edme himself. That Edme's reputation will probably suffer more that Shaw's is just funny.
sp4rki 16y ago
Two things: 1) It was not plagiarizing, it was copyright infringement, and they are both not mutually inclusive and are completely different. Martin didn't appropriate the content or idea of the book and called it his own, he publish the start of an attempt of a 'book hack' stating the original author and intent. 2) Do you equate fart noises with a person making a mistake in the name of providing something useful to the community? The dude made a mistake, a mistake that in no way reflects on his amount of class, but does reflect on his drive to provide something useful to the Open Source community. Sure he should be corrected, as he did make a mistake, but he should not be degraded in any way as has been done in this case. PD: Who has more class, the person who farts in a restaurant, or the person that calls him on it publicly without knowing the reasons for him doing it and does so with intent to degrade such person?
- Semiapies 16y ago
  You're trying to wrap all this up in justifications of what he did this "in the name of". How someone justifies something like this is irrelevant. The basic rule for material, absent an explicit other license, is copyright. Shaw is generous enough to offer a less restrictive license, but that license is clear on its terms. To ignore the license given on a work, whether it's copyright, some CC non-commercial variant, GPL, or whatever is indeed a classless act. And if you want to linger on "providing something useful", Zed has pointed out and Martin acknowledged that this approach is not useful for advancing Ruby education. (For that matter, it was a dead project.) Shaw has now provided a guide on how to make a book of this style at http://sheddingbikes.com/posts/1288945508.html http://sheddingbikes.com/posts/1288945508.html Also, it's "make fart noises", not "fart". As in deliberately make a noise considered rude. Copying and pasting a book and putting it in a public repository isn't a semi-voluntary bodily function.
  - sp4rki 16y ago
    For starters, I'm not justifying anything Martin did, as I never said he was right in any way, don't try to put words in mouth. As a matter of fact, I agreed on the following: 1) Zed has every right to complain due to his copyright and the license which his work carries 2) What Martin did was wrong, and as such he should accept that fact that the owner disapproves and take the work down (which he did) 3) Martin violated Zed's copyright. I explicitly said that what he did was copyright infringement, which can certainly be attributed to a mistake, because you wrongly stated it was plagiarism, which is considered morally unacceptable and reprehensible, and is in no way the same thing. You want to know what IS irrelevant? The fact that Martin and Zed (and both you and me actually) both acknowledged that the approach is not useful, specially since I already stated in the grandparent post - to which you responded - that I agreed on not only Zed's rights as copyright holder, but also on the fact that the approach is rubbish. It doesn't matter whatsoever if the approach works or not, it only matters that Martin did it in good faith because he believed it could be of use when he started, even if later he discovered to be wrong on this count. I addressed your fart noises on my second point of the parent post, on the last paragraph I was referring to actual farting because it is more representative of what happened here. I referred to them separately and referred to 'farting' and 'farting noises' to make this clear (as they are obviously two different things). The fact that you equate a jerk making farting noises in a restaurant with making a mistake in regards to a free book's licensing is beyond my comprehension, as it implies that you're disagreeing with the intent of the person in question when it was already not only stated by him, but by Zed himself in his messages. Also, it's "make fart noises", not "fart". As in deliberately make a noise considered rude. You said it yourself, the key word on this example is 'deliberately'. Martin did not make deliberately farting noises (deliberately and knowingly doing copyright infringement on Zed's work), he actually farted by mistake (mistakenly having violated Zed's copyright thinking it was fair use), and because of this he should apologize to the restaurant, but such events in no way grant Zed the right to humiliate, demean, or degrade Martin. I'm not justifying Martin's actions, as I agree that he's wrong and Zed is right, I'm criticizing Zed's responses and the manner in which he expressed himself towards not only towards Martin, but towards the Ruby community itself. The funny thing is that I actually respect Zed for his contributions, and isn't someone I'll be deleting from my newsreader because of something as non-important as this. That doesn't change his attitude was reprehensible, and that he could have handled it better.