4 ms·

Enforced telemetry for free users? That's gross.

by _joel 2y ago

red_admiral 2y ago
Not only that, but according to the licence agreement, there are "technical countermeasures" to stop you from using the product if you were to block telemetry with a firewall (presumably it stops working if the telemetry server doesn't send back an acknowledgement), and "You understand and agree that Licensor may use and disclose personal information collected as part of Telemetry in accordance with Licensor's Privacy Policy" ... wait, what?
- michaelt 2y ago
  In the closed source world it's common enough that free trials will be something along the lines of "we give you a license key tied to your name, and every time you start the software it calls into our license server to validate the license key" It's bad, but it's not unusual if you use closed-source software.
  - ezekg 2y ago
    Sure, but I'm not sure why they wouldn't just use a signed license file with a start- and stop-date in this case. Lots of companies, especially enterprises, run air-gaps and telemetry just won't work there. And they should know that... it's their target market after all...
  - red_admiral 2y ago
    I guess this is fine for a free _trial_, if you can host it in some separate firewalled-off subnet where it doesn't touch your real customer data. The issue here is that if you're an org with less than $10M turnover, you're currently on the Core plan and don't want to negotiate the full "Enterprise" licence (which is presumably priced towards larger users than you anyway), then you can't use the thing at all anymore unless you agree to telemetry and some vague disclosure of personal data thing that will get your lawyers in a spin (especially if you serve states in which GDPR applies). EDIT: oh, and PCI-DSS requirements if you want to take credit cards? That's going to be fun.
  - sakjur 2y ago
    I really hope they’re more lenient than that. Having a database go offline because their telemetry servers are down, slow, or unreachable seems inconvenient.
    - darkstar_16 2y ago
      I can't find it now but I think I read words to the effect that performance is degraded if one isn't using the correct license or something, even for v23.x versions.
- WatchDog 2y ago
  They have indicated that they will continue to make the source available. Assuming you pay for a license, does the license prevent you from building your own fork, and patching out the telemetry code?

Enforced telemetry for free users? That's gross.

by _joel 2y ago

Enforced telemetry for free users? That's gross.

Not only that, but according to the licence agreement, there are "technical countermeasures" to stop you from using the product if you were to block telemetry with a firewall (presumably it stops working if the telemetry server doesn't send back an acknowledgement), and "You understand and agree that Licensor may use and disclose personal information collected as part of Telemetry in accordance with Licensor's Privacy Policy" ... wait, what?

michaelt 2y ago
In the closed source world it's common enough that free trials will be something along the lines of "we give you a license key tied to your name, and every time you start the software it calls into our license server to validate the license key" It's bad, but it's not unusual if you use closed-source software.
- ezekg 2y ago
  Sure, but I'm not sure why they wouldn't just use a signed license file with a start- and stop-date in this case. Lots of companies, especially enterprises, run air-gaps and telemetry just won't work there. And they should know that... it's their target market after all...
- red_admiral 2y ago
  I guess this is fine for a free _trial_, if you can host it in some separate firewalled-off subnet where it doesn't touch your real customer data. The issue here is that if you're an org with less than $10M turnover, you're currently on the Core plan and don't want to negotiate the full "Enterprise" licence (which is presumably priced towards larger users than you anyway), then you can't use the thing at all anymore unless you agree to telemetry and some vague disclosure of personal data thing that will get your lawyers in a spin (especially if you serve states in which GDPR applies). EDIT: oh, and PCI-DSS requirements if you want to take credit cards? That's going to be fun.
- sakjur 2y ago
  I really hope they’re more lenient than that. Having a database go offline because their telemetry servers are down, slow, or unreachable seems inconvenient.
  - darkstar_16 2y ago
    I can't find it now but I think I read words to the effect that performance is degraded if one isn't using the correct license or something, even for v23.x versions.
WatchDog 2y ago
They have indicated that they will continue to make the source available. Assuming you pay for a license, does the license prevent you from building your own fork, and patching out the telemetry code?