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Sony Pirates KDE Artwork
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- speeder 14y agoI like Sony, but some stuff they did in the past was highly questionable and may come back to haunt them, specially when some random artist at them use someone else artwork. The best thing Sony can do is fix this, say sorry, and punish the guy that did this. But.I have a hunch that they won't do that.
- pbhjpbhj 14y ago>and punish the guy that did this // Couldn't they just add LGPL3 to the website and acknowledge the work of those who helped [albeit in this case in a small way] create their website unpaid?
- Zealot 14y agoIt's also in their UEFI settings. I've seen it with my own eyes.
- adventured 14y agoKarma has perhaps already worked wonders. $14 billion market value, down 75% from 2007, and down 60% in just the last year. The company has nearly been demolished by the incompetent management. Remains to be seen if they'll learn from their cultural problems or not (many of which no doubt contributed to their current mess).
- jezclaremurugan 14y agoOr how about donating some money to KDE...
- unreal37 14y agoThey most certainly will pay $1000 to license the image, or change it, AND punish the person who did that... What makes you think Sony won't work they way every large corporation works in this respect?
- rolfvandekrol 14y agoCome on kids, the rootkits on audio CDs are already history for quite a while. Yes, they shouldn't copy stuff from others, but why link it to past mistakes?
- easytiger 14y agoIt sells newspapers. People have a tiny little mental self congratulatory orgasm when they link things together
- edent 14y agoCome on, he murdered that guy once and it was years ago! Why should we forget when a company acts so maliciously? Why shouldn't we point out that they have a pattern of misbehaviour?
- Nursie 14y agoThe lawsuits against people trying to mod their own consoles are not so long ago. They've a long history of being assholes about their 'IP'. And it's linked to this because it's irony, dumbass.
- pbhjpbhj 14y agoDon't you think it demonstrates, in at least a small way, how companies like Sony continue to preach the benefits of strong, long-lived copyright protection and still continue to play fast-and-loose with the equivalent rights of small companies, FOSS and individuals. The link to past "misdemeanours" demonstrates a continued failure with respect to the rights of others.
- viseztrance 14y agoHonest question. Did the author even attempted to contact Sony or anyone in the KDE organization to resolve this issue?
- tomp 14y agoDoes it matter (legally)?
- wuest 14y agoSony being willing to install rootkits on people's PCs and being quite sue-happy over copyright infringement, then turning around and violating copyright and licensing terms matters in a social context. Sony needs to live up to their own standards (which I would prefer means they need to change their standards, but realistically means that they need to at least obey what they enforce). Violating the GPL terms matters legally.
- aviraldg 14y agoHonest question. Does Sony do the same when someone accidentally uses their licensed material?
- nkozyra 14y agoIn lieu of blogging about it? Yeah, yeah they do.
- emn13 14y agoYeah, they stick to less serious steps such as lawsuits and rootkits instead of something this egregious.
- nkozyra 14y agoObviously not "less serious," although certainly more to the point. We can go with "less passive aggressive." Not that I have a problem with this method, but it isn't usually done with the end goal of fixing the problem.
- manmal 14y agoThat's a serious case of Google-Image-Searchitis. My theory: somebody googled for "settings icon", swore to himself to get proper artwork later, forgot, and there we have it. (Yes, I'm guilty of that too, but I usually don't forget)
- networked 14y agoWhich is why we need a consistent way to embed license data into media. Not as "enforceable" DRM but as metadata that is preserved by image editing software and can be checked automatically when you are about to send your creation to production. EXIF theoretically allows for this but it is hardly ever used.
- bruceboughton 14y agoSo EXIF allows this but is hardly ever used. Sounds like this is a people problem, not a technical problem.
- networked 14y agoIt's both (which is to say, it's about HCI). People would be more eager to use whatever license embedding mechanism we agreed upon if it was as easy as right click -> "License as..." -> "Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0". That is not the case right now.
- bruceboughton 14y agoThat solves the license input but doesn't make anyone more likely to check the license at go-live time.
- networked 14y ago> That solves the license input but doesn't make anyone more likely to check the license at go-live time. My point is exactly that you shouldn't have to. If all your license information sat in the files themselves checking licensing would be accomplished by adding a few standard lines to your deployment script. If your website used Creative Commons-licensed media your CMS would even be able to generate attribution data to be shown at the bottom of the pages that use that media on its own resulting in fully automated compliance.
- Zealot 14y agoSo what now? Are we going to see Sony GPL'ing their UEFI implementation?
- lucian1900 14y agoThe artwork is licensed LGPL, so there is no GPL-ing necessary.
- dan1234 14y agoThe image is under LGPL3, all they really need to do is acknowledge this and provide copies of the image and derivatives.
- rossy 14y agoI wonder if this happens because of open source being mistaken for public domain. I've definitely had lecturers who confuse the two.
- rmc 14y agoWhat's funny is that is' happening both ways. Lots of people are confusing "copyright infringement" with "claiming another work as your own". There was an article here about mundane/average computer users trying to use copyrighted music tracks on YouTube, and it being banned. Users were confused how it was being taken down for 'copyright infringement' when the person wasn't claiming it was their music.
- Amadou 14y agoAttribution is a pretty standard component of the moral rights associated with copyright in many non-US countries. In the US, moral rights (versus economic rights) are hardly protected at all. For the most part they are limited to riding the coat-tails of economic rights. Yet, as your example shows, the right of attribution is the kind of right that many people naturally perceive as a "fair" part of copyright, much more fair than the right to control distribution.
- whalesalad 14y agoWhile this blows ... it's a bummer that companies keep getting blamed when things like this happen. Sure, at some point an employee is a reflection of a company but at the end of the day a person did this. It's easy to point the finger at a big company and use this as fud against them. But really... the correct title should be "Someone who works for Sony pirated KDE artwork."
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- nodata 14y agoMy sarcasm filter is failing here: do you seriously mean what you wrote?
- mixedbit 14y agoShould we also write: "Someone who works for Sony created PS3"?
- Argorak 14y agoThey are a company that sue others at high costs for similar missteps.
- rmc 14y agoSorry, one cannot have it both ways. When one copies a music track that was sung by someone who works for Sony, who sues you? Sony (with all their legal & financial resources)? Or the person who sung the track? The answer is Sony. Likewise, Sony is responsible for putting this out there. Sony (or anyone) cannot have it both ways when it suits them.
- damoncali 14y agoI get what you're saying- this is almost certainly a case where one employee was either lazy or ignorant and just found a nice icon. Not a big deal. But, it was in the service of a company and the corporation is responsible for it. In a sane world, what that means is that someone from KDE would point it out to them, and Sony would say "Ooops. That was a mistake. We'll change it. Sorry.". Who knows what happens in the real world.
- NamTaf 14y agoThis isn't the first time Sony's ripped artwork off. Back in early 2006 I left a webpage comment (haha, remember them?) with the admins at Digital Blasphemy (that CGI desktop wallpaper site everyone loved back in the day) because I was playing with a mate's Sony W800i mobile phone and noticed that they'd ripped off an image called 'Fluroescence' [1] to create an animated mobile background image - there's a whole series of that image in different colours with different transparencies and they'd just grabbed them all and made an anmiated GIF that faded between them. In doing so, they'd cropped the DigitalBlasphemy watermark in making it a portrait aspect ratio and as far as I could tell not credited DB anywhere. I ended up getting a 'thanks I'll look in to it' reply, but don't know if anything ever came of it. I figured at the time it may have been the mistake of a lazy artwork designer but part of management of such a project surely must be to ensure that all of the content is legit. It's certainly interesting to see that this company has done this again. As previously, it may well have been the work of a lone employee but it is still the company's responbility to stop that behaviour. I hope KDE can get a favourable resolution to this problem. [1]: http://digitalblasphemy.com/preview.shtml?i=fluorescence http://digitalblasphemy.com/preview.shtml?i=fluorescence
- mpyne 14y agoThe Digital Blasphemy guy later worked with some developers to make some PS3 "Live Wallpapers" based on his artwork... perhaps that was in reaction to what you pointed out?
- polshaw 14y agoThis leads me to a legal question about GPL stuff.. Say the guys at KDE threw their full legal might behind this- what would happen to Sony? Obviously they would be required to change it (or include the GPL licence), but is that all? What kind of 'damages' could be claimed in such a situation?.. ie what is the risk to Sony in doing this. NB i'm using this (somewhat trivial) example to talk about GPL violation more broadly.
- freehunter 14y agoWell, it is still copyright infringement. It doesn't matter if the copyright says you can do whatever you want as long as you mention our license, if you don't follow the terms you're still infringing on their copyright.
- manaskarekar 14y agoI think he's asking about stuff like 'What kind of damages can KDE claim due to "lost sales", since it's not software that is usually sold.'
- belorn 14y agoLost sales is normally calculated as some hypothetical price tag in the case if Sony had bought a license from KDE. Its what music labels do when calculating damages in p2p cases, rather than looking at the unit cost.
- mdda 14y agoIsn't the standard metric $150,000 per infringement? AFAIR, that's the statutory rate they apply for MP3 pirating.
- belorn 14y agoDepend on the judge and jury. It could come down to damges per sold unit if Sony is seen as intentional breaking copyright law, especially from this point on after Sony has become aware of the issue. In more likeness, KDE can now prevent any future sale of VAIO if they want, but asking a judge for an injunction. Of course, this assume that the copyright law is sanely being interpreted. If we use movie/music version of it, KDE can then dictate what a "license agreement" would cost for sony if they were to "buy" the image. They could then say "If we were to buy a similar image from apple, they would require this cart loads of money so that's what Sony should pay + damages and lawyer costs.
- anonymous 14y agoI think unfortunately the best case of action would be for KDE to sue Sony pre-emptively. Otherwise, some lawyer on Sony's side would notice KDE using "their" icon and sue KDE.
- meaty 14y agoI think KDE's source control system would prove otherwise...
- espadrine 14y agoI doubt Sony's lawyers care about that. KDE would care about trial costs, though. Do they have a budget for that?
- freehunter 14y agoI would expect for a name like KDE they wouldn't have to worry about it. If the FSF doesn't pick up the bill, if the EFF doesn't pick up the bill, if someone else doesn't pick up the bill they'd have a donation drive. There's no way KDE would have to worry about paying lawyer fees if Sony sues them for their own original artwork.
- clhodapp 14y agoSo wait, in order to avoid the risk of trial costs in a situation someone on the internet made up, KDE should ensure that they have to pay trial costs by suing?
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- rwrwrwrw 14y agohttp://www.legionhardware.com/images/review/Asrock_Z77_Extreme11_vs_Gigabyte_Z77X-UP7/Asrock_UEFI_03T.jpg http://www.legionhardware.com/images/review/Asrock_Z77_Extre... Look at the "Boot" logo. IMHO this is from transmission torrent client.
- niggler 14y agoI could be misremembering, but wasn't there a case last year where GPL code was found in Sony playstation software?
- jacquesm 14y agohttp://web.archive.org/web/20020808140127im_/http://www.truetech.com/images/homepage_header.gif http://web.archive.org/web/20020808140127im_/http://www.true... On the left hand side of that image you see a little segment that conists of a hand, an eye and an ear. Those stand for interaction, video and audio. TrueTech hired Jonathan Kraij, a talented young designer to make that logo and it was featured in many places, magazines such as wave and many others besides in the late 90's. Not three weeks after one prominent bout of exposure the logo appeared in an advertising campaign by Sony the Netherlands. We talked it over with them and they traced it to a guy working for one of the agencies that designed the campaign. He'd most likely been subconsciously influenced by exposure from a magazine. Sony was pretty good about it, promised they wouldn't use the logo any further and paid us a fair bit of money to offset the use. All in all it could have been a lot worse and I think that before you start using words like 'pirates' you have to dig a little deeper to be sure that it was intentional and that it wasn't some external party that caused this. Sony is a damaged brand, they've done lots of terribly stupid stuff but at a minimum they should be given the benefit of the doubt until there is hard proof they did this on purpose. We all know Sony fucked up in the past but that is no reason to automatically assume they did so again without any proof.
- appleflaxen 14y agoInteresting historical point. The point that I take away from the current episode, though, is that Sony is profoundly hypocritical. They are a "damaged brand" because of their past actions. That shouldn't give them a free pass, but should instead cause increased scrutiny. And yet again, it appears that increased scrutiny is warranted.
- Argorak 14y agoWhile you are right, a lot of the backlash is somewhat deserved: Sony was and is aggressive in pursuing their copyrights, which is part of the damage to their brand. I don't think they did this on purpose. But they are part of a group of companies that don't care about those complexities when they sue others on copyright grounds, so they should tread very carefully there.
- belorn 14y ago
- moondowner 14y agoHere's the license for the icon used from the KDE Oxygen icon theme: http://www.oxygen-icons.org/?page_id=4 http://www.oxygen-icons.org/?page_id=4 "Oxygen icon theme is dual licensed. You may copy it under the Creative Common Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 License or the GNU Library General Public License."
- rikacomet 14y agowait! shhhh! don't let the guys at TPB know of this, they are gonna laugh until they die from this :P
- kenkam 14y agoSuch a shame Sony pirated their artwork. Also, such a shame the article introduces Sony as "the company who created Audio CDs which installed a rootkit on Windows computer to try to stop people copying music", as if Sony needed introduction, especially for people that read the KDE blog. Maybe it would have been more effective to point them out in a matter-of-fact way, tell them to stop or to comply with the licence, and move on. It would certainly come across as more mature, more about problem solving, and less about name bashing. I appreciate though it is hard to keep a level headed tone if it were to happen to me..., but there's no harm in trying!
- hkmurakami 14y agoI thought the quote was appropriate in providing the context in which the irony of Sony's copyright violation in question has taken place.
- mpyne 14y agoIt's not an "article", it's a KDE deveoper's personal blog. The "blogs.kde.org" I would have hoped gave that away.
- abrahamsen 14y agoI thought at first it was a positive introduction: "the company who created Audio CDs".
- onemorepassword 14y agoAlso known as the last honest and not deliberately crippled or degraded product to come out of the music industry.
- shrikant 14y agoOnly till they realised CD rippers exist, and CD-RWs became popular and affordable. Then came the DRM and rootkits.
- rplnt 14y agoI don't think "pirated" is the right word.
- Fargren 14y agoWell, "pirated" is probably not the right word for anything less than armed robbery of a boat. But lately it's been used as a synonym of "copyright infringement", so maybe it applies.
- nollidge 14y agoIn the context of software, "piracy" has come to mean downloading and distributing copyrighted material. And I think it's fine to use it for that, even though it doesn't happen on the high seas (usually?). But this is more like plagiarism, although I'd be fine with calling it stealing or theft, which have a pretty broad meaning colloquially.
- mpyne 14y agoAre you saying that the image is not, in fact, used in the UEFI firmware Sony is distributing?
- nollidge 14y agoThat's a good point, actually. I should have read closer.
- Fargren 14y ago>>In the context of software, "piracy" has come to mean downloading and distributing copyrighted material. Odd, I thought if I downloaded, say, a game from a warez site I would be branded a pirate even if I didn't distribute it afterwards.
- nollidge 14y agoThat's true, but I'm not sure I want to model my language usage after overzealous RIAA lawyers :-)
- damian2000 14y agoI've got another less exciting reason how it ended up there... someone at Sony or one of their contractors found it on here: http://www.iconarchive.com/show/oxygen-icons-by-oxygen-icons.org/Categories-preferences-system-icon.html http://www.iconarchive.com/show/oxygen-icons-by-oxygen-icons... It says there "commercial usage allowed". They probably didn't even know it was from KDE.
- more_original 14y agoYes, commercial use is allowed, but the LGPL requires attribution. The site you give does link prominently to the LGPL license.
- username3 14y agoThese sites don't. http://www.tineye.com/search/20fd99e0d87a8d04e30b5c307d81b497229e33cf/ http://www.tineye.com/search/20fd99e0d87a8d04e30b5c307d81b49...
- solarexplorer 14y agoThis seems to be an image search site like google images. It does find the same icon on toshiba.com: http://us.toshiba.com/computers/accessories http://us.toshiba.com/computers/accessories This icon seems to be very popular indeed...
- jlogsdon 14y agoIt doesn't fit on that Toshiba page at all! Everything is dark and then bam white and yellow!
- jacquesm 14y ago> Yes, commercial use is allowed, but the LGPL requires attribution. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_Lesser_General_Public_License http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_Lesser_General_Public_Licen... http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/lesser.html http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/lesser.html Where does it say that, I can't find the word attribution on there? Do you maybe mean the creative commons license?
- stevewilhelm 14y agoI think the real headline should be "Proof that at least one person at Sony has used KDE"
- mbel 14y agoNot really, apart from the other software utilizing this icon, this "inspiration" might have come form a quick search [0] :(. [0] https://www.google.com/search?q=preferences+icon&tbm=isch https://www.google.com/search?q=preferences+icon&tbm=isc... (this particular icon is one of the topmost results in my surely personalized search)
- jason_slack 14y agoThe KDE Developer that wrote this needs to take a deep breath...they asked: "Should KDE e.V. and Nuno's Oxygen friends start a new business model by sueing them for everything they're worth?" Really? Sue them for all they are worth? Go ahead and try, but you need money to sue and no Judge is going to award you "All they are worth" over an icon. You haven't lost anything with Sony using this icon. You have gained because now there is an subconscious association between Sony and KDE. Well, for those that even recognise that it is KDE artwork to begin with.
- mpyne 14y ago> You have gained because now there is an subconscious association between Sony and KDE. I can only speak for myself, but I don't think those of us at KDE would find it desirable to have that association in people's minds. I would actually say that would be a negative. > Well, for those that even recognise that it is KDE artwork to begin with. So only artwork which has saturated the public eye warrants protection?
- jason_slack 14y agoOh, no, I surely think that Sony did wrong and needs to admit the mistake but that picking and choosing one's battles might be more appropriate here. I disagree with the author's blog post on making a big stink and "suing them for all they are worth". Yes, maybe just a saying that everyone understands the meaning to but it doesn't lent any credibility or help justify the issue at hand. Which is Sony used the artwork. When people start tossing around hyperbole it doesn't help, it hinders. I have less compassion for KDE over this because of the way the blog author worded this. Had the author approached this in a more profession manner than spouting off at the mouth I would be more onboard.
- mpyne 14y agoIs it hyperbole, really, when the same argument would be applied in the opposite direction? I know that KDE somehow has a reputation for quiet professionalism [1], but I don't think that should extend to a developer's personal opinion, nor do I think that pointing out the hyperbole of someone else is itself an example of hyperbole. Especially when the hyperbole is so obviously hyperbolic! [1] http://inmyholyopinion.com/2007/05/11/gnome-vs-kde/ http://inmyholyopinion.com/2007/05/11/gnome-vs-kde/
- berlinbrown 14y agoIn post Aaron world, come on. Seriously?
- grecy 14y agoUnfortunately, I honestly think the best course of action is to sue Sony for every penny possible. The case needs to get as much press and possible, and people need to see how completely ridiculous the whole thing is. More and more cases like this need to tie up the court system, wasting everyone's time and money. This is the only way we'll get copyright reform.
- hkmurakami 14y agoA part of me would like to see such a torching strategy. Yet I feel a strong resistance from another part of myself -- a part of me that believes that OSS would do better by taking the high road, by continuing to be one of the few areas/markets/communities, commercial or otherwise, that lives the life it preaches for the world. If OSS devolves to "one of the pack", then I feel like we'd lose something fundamental and core to the only viable players for the moral high ground strategy. Don't we already have enough companies showing the world how ugly litigation can be?
- anonymous 14y agoOh no, I don't want them to win. At most, SONY will just add a "we use icons from KDE, licensed under LGPL" as a tiny text somewhere. The goal isn't to win a case against SONY and score massive profits from damages. The goal is to not be on the wrong end of a suit.
- unreal37 14y ago"Every penny possible" is like $1000, which is the going rate for icon licensing. Sony would just pay it. No "copyright reform" will happen from this.
- ajross 14y agoFrankly I doubt they'd see even that. It's an LGPL icon, it's quite literally available for free, just not under the terms that Sony assumed.
- baby 14y agoBut here we're clever and we know that behind Sony, this is the mistake of a stupid web developer. Right? EDIT: http://www.iconarchive.com/show/oxygen-icons-by-oxygen-icons.org/Categories-preferences-system-icon.html http://www.iconarchive.com/show/oxygen-icons-by-oxygen-icons... This thread is a nice flame war.
- michaelbuddy 14y agoNo doubt. What the hell is wrong with half the people in this thread. Pent up hostility against an invisible monster.
- josephlord 14y agoAs a former Sony employee although in the consumer TV's business rather than either Vaio or Sony Music I'm pretty confident it is a mistake and that it is likely to be fixed. [The Sony TV's came with a paper license in the box for all the various open source licenses of the software included in the TV and I believe there is a website with all the relevant source.] If it is used in a website is it really a breach of the terms of the LGPL? I thought that the whole point behind the Affero GPL was that the normal GPL/LGPL did not prevent you using software server side to present a service to users without the requirement to distribute the source. Given that I'm not sure what the status would be of an image under LGPL (dual license with Creative Commons Sharealike, attribution as mentioned by another commenter) being served as part of the website software. Now maybe it is reasonable to say that Javascript and images are actually distributed to every browser accessing the page and that therefore source code and license must be made available but it isn't completely clear to me. Whatever the technical legal case it was bad form and most likely a mistake for Sony to use this icon in this way. Edit to add: Sony is a massive sprawling multi-limbed business with actions from different parts sometimes not just contradictory but conflicting at times. It is all done under the Sony name so it is fair that bad in addition to good actions are reflected in the reputation but the reality is that there is very little shared between the Music arm putting out rootkits (about eight years ago - maybe it is time to move on) and the electronics side.
- Argorak 14y agoThe problem is not that it is used. Its used without attribution and correct licensing information, especially as the website states that all material is copyrighted(!).
- kamjam 14y agoThey seem to be followin the "ask for forgiveness, not for permission" philosophy!
- josephlord 14y agoSony should not have claimed copyright and should not have used it without attribution. I'm however not sure of the legal status of components of LGPL software that are downloaded components of a hosted service. If they are not "distributed" the license brings no requirements does it?
- csense 14y agoWhile we're all hating on Sony, let's remember how they removed the ability to install Linux on the Playstation 3 [1] [2]. They're a company that does malicious things to users. Please, boycott Sony. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Playstation_3#OtherOS_support http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Playstation_3#OtherOS_support [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OtherOS http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OtherOS EDIT: Citation added, because I was downvoted.
- tomc1985 14y agoLook at this completely disproportionate response over one lousy icon. As someone else mentioned, this is likely the result of a lazy graphic designer, not corporate malice. How many KDE users have pirated Sony content anyway, hmm?