Linux Mint Diverting Banshee Revenue 178
LinuxScribe writes "According Linux Mint founder Clement Lefebvre, the popular Linux Mint distribution has changed the Amazon.com affiliate code for the Banshee music player so that Mint, not Canonical or the GNOME Foundation, will receive the revenue from MP3 sales through Banshee. Though a trivial amount of money ($3.41 in November 2011), Linux Mint's actions still raise the question: how should revenue be shared between upstream and downstream FLOSS projects?"
wuh (Score:4, Funny)
They deserve it (Score:5, Insightful)
Linux Mint 12 made GNOME3 usable. They deserve the $3.41.
Re:They deserve it (Score:5, Insightful)
Linux Mint 12 made GNOME3 usable.
That they did, but it was still buggy as hell for me. I'm still running Linux Mint but I'm on MATE for now. Thankfully thought, I can at least see that Mint's extensions at least take Gnome3 in a direction that I can agree with, once a few more of the issues are ironed out.
At a minimum, Linux Mint seems to be at least TRYING to cater to their users, as opposed to Ubuntu and Gnome who just keep plowing ahead tell the entire userbase that they're wrong.
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as opposed to Ubuntu and Gnome who just keep plowing ahead tell the entire userbase that they're wrong.
Ubuntu has tablet myopia. Will someone please tell them not everything is a tablet!
Re:They deserve it (Score:5, Insightful)
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We'll come back to this when Wayland becomes usable.
Or, we'll come back to it when Wayland gets adopted and removes so many of the nice features that X11 users have been enjoying since 1987.
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Could you please name them?
Sure: network transparency is 1. I find it much better than your experiences, personally. It depends on having well written programs of course. The best fix would be to adopt an X12 protocol which puts proper font rendering back in the server and modifies the features which cause high latency. NX client is heavily based on X, but is the best remote GUI system available by a wide margin.
The second is flexibility in window managers. The geniuses in charge of Wayland seem to be tryin
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The best fix would be to adopt an X12 protocol which puts proper font rendering back in the server
X11 already has proper font rendering on the server via the XRender extension. The server handles the rendering, the client provides the glyphs. This is superior to the old approach of making the server provide the glyphs because it means that you can install an application + fonts on a machine and use it anywhere without having to install the fonts on every X server (which is hard if they're dumb terminals) and means that you can do things like embed fonts in documents.
The second is flexibility in window managers
And compositing managers. Wayland
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X11 already has proper font rendering on the server via the XRender extension. The server handles the rendering, the client provides the glyphs. This is superior to the old approach of making the server provide the glyphs because it means that you can install an application + fonts on a machine and use it anywhere without having to install the fonts on every X server (which is hard if they're dumb terminals) and means that you can do things like embed fonts in documents.
I'm not convinced that's the best met
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A better approach would be to move something like Cairo to the server, so you could upload bezier paths and reference them by name (actually, just arbitrary snippets of PDF data would be ideal, but then you've practically reinvented Quartz). The problem with uploading 'fonts' is that you need to specify a font format. Most fonts these days will be in TrueType format, or maybe OpenType format, but PDFs embed PostScript fonts (type 1, 2, or 3...), DVIs use MetaFont, and so on. You're requiring the display
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Do you know what the current status of Wayland is? I was hoping it'd be ready for the last release.
Re:They deserve it (Score:5, Insightful)
Wayland is the way of the future.
It has futuristic things like:
* No network transparency!
* Client side window decorations! This will offer the following futuristic features:
* Every toolkit providing subtly different window decorations
* Hung applications have immovable windows which get in the way and make life suck, like other popular operating systems
* Impossible to use a decoration free tiling window manager to maximize screenspace
* Impossible to use a window manager which adds useful extra window decorations and functions
* And apparently, endless arguments about how copy/paste should work.
But hey, at least it will provide a much needed performance boost for those of us still stuck on a Sun 3/60. Also, the .1ms latency introduced by a compositing window manager has really been bugging me recently.
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Well, how many desktop users actually use network transparency? (only a minority of users). And how many desktop users want applications that don't look like Windows 95 applications? (the majority of users).
Linux has always catered to the technical crowd, not the mojority of potential users. The Quixhotic quest to get "normal users" will only end up annoying the technical users.
I use network transparency regularly. And none of my applications look like Windows 95 ones. It may have escaped your notice, but X
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Seriously, what's so bad about client-side decorations?
The fact that some applications aren't always well written, and may crash, and also the fact we'd like to have everything in the window decorations to be drawn with the same way, with same colors, etc.
Also, I don't think nobody is trying to take network transparency away from you.
Every new application implementing Wayland and *not* X, will not work remotely. It would be the first time in the Linux world that some windowed wouldn't work remotely. How isn't this taking away network transparency from me?
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So someone is trying to take network transparency away from me?!
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Well, how many desktop users actually use network transparency? (only a minority of users).
- Choosing to ignore a functionality, because only a minority needs is a bad argument. Best is to have all features, always.
- Saying that a functionality should be dropped because of something that has nothing to do with it (eg: the look of applications has nothing to do with networking capability of a windowing system, really...) sounds revert-thinking. Why can't we have BOTH networking and a nice look?
- Writing that you know what so "many [Linux] desktop users want" is also quite pretending.
See how Wayland fits in the picture very well?
I would have
Re:They deserve it (Score:5, Informative)
Not in the project's scope - Wayland is a display server; it makes sure that crap in memory buffers wind up on the screen in the correct order. You can always run an X server to get your network transparency (this is, after all, how Wayland is first going to be used).
Sigh. No. Wayland's stated goal is to replace X. See for instance talks by the main authors about "Life after X". People are now making toolkits that target Wayland directly. History shows that if network transparency is not built into a windowing syatem from the beginning then it will suck. Dodging the issue by claiming it is not within the scope will not make the final result suck any less.
Not necessaroly
How did you work that out?
Hung applications have immovable windows which get in the way and make life suck, like other popular operating systems
Use your brain. If applications are responsible for decorating windows and therefore generating their own move/iconify requests, then a hung application won't respond. Just like hoe huing applications have immovable windows on OSX and Windows.
Impossible to use a decoration free tiling window manager to maximize screenspace
Impossible to use a window manager which adds useful extra window decorations and functions
[citation needed]
Again use your brain. If the application draws the decorations, how will the window manager augment them or completely change them without resorting to awful bodgery?
Clipboard functionality is not trivial to implement in a robust and interoperable fashion. Copying and pasting is, for the time being, still hacked and duct-taped together under all major Unix desktops.
[citation needed]
Actually, you're talking rubbish. I have implemented copy/paste in xlib which interoperates with every program and datatype I tested it with. The X11 copy/paste mechanism is actually really sensible and well designed. It goes something like this:
Prog 1: I have the clipboard!
Prog 2: I want to paste.
Prog 1: Well, I can offer you this list of datatypes which are now mostly MIME types
Prog 2: Excellent. I'll have image/jpeg, please.
Prog 1: OK, then. Here you go.
That's basically it. There are some minor wrinkles, like the "here you go" part having a mechanism for chunking the data so the server doesn't have to hold it all, and programs don't have to do special things to avoid hanging with large pastes over slow networks. But basically, it's simple, robust and effective. It's also sufficiently flexible that XDnD was added without any server or API changes, just using existing mechanisms. And it's also sufficiently flexible to allow the sort of persistent clipboards which exist on other operating systems, which work as follows:
Prog 1: I have the clipboard. ... same negotiation as above ...
Clipboard manager: Gimme everything.
Prog 1: OK.
Clipboard manager: I have the clipboard! I can offer ALL THESE datatypes...
Again, simple, ffective and robust.
It's going to bring internal overhead to a minimum, by letting the kernel manage the hardware, take care of double-buffering and minimize the amount of work needed to actually draw anything - have you ever actually tried to write an X application?
Yes. I've spent more time messing around with Xlib than with toolkits.
You could also try taking a look at smspillaz's blog, where he regularly pulls his hair out over some brain-dead functionality or unexpected race-condition and deadlocks caused by X..
That's curious. Given that X11 is single threaded, I wonder how he gets race conditions. I've never found one.
Oh, and it's still not possible to get vsync working on a multi-monitor setup (and not even all single-monitor setups) under X.
Works for me. The problem with more than one monitor is when they run at different refresh rates. There's nothing inherent in X which makes it any le
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What century are you living in? Hung apps don't freeze the window in Windows. You can minimize, maximize, restore or even just move the windows.
In general, you are an idiot. X sucks unless you absolutely must have network transparency. 99.999999999% of the time, 100% of people don't need it.
Re:They deserve it (Score:5, Insightful)
X11 is not the problem, the video drivers are...
SGI machines were supporting multi head high speed setups using X11 in the days before x86 machines could even support multi head at all.
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Simple (Score:5, Funny)
A dollar for me, one for you, one for me, one for.... oh well, here's 41 cents at least.
Re:Simple (Score:4, Funny)
One for me, one for you. One, two for me, two for you. One, two, three for me, three for you...
i think that's might be the official RIAA/MPAA accounting method.
Find a better case for the discussion (Score:4, Insightful)
Though a trivial amount of money ($3.41 in November 2011)
Trivial? No shit!
Seriously: find a better case for this discussion. Arguing over less than 4 bucks is going to make everyone involved seem petty and small-minded.
- Jesper
Re:Find a better case for the discussion (Score:5, Funny)
A petty and small minded internet debate about software freedom? That's unpossible!
Re:Find a better case for the discussion (Score:5, Insightful)
This has nothing to do with software freedom. It's not a question of whether Mint should have the right to do it, but whether they are jerks or not by doing it.
Kids argue over 3,41 (Score:3, Insightful)
This has nothing to do with software freedom. It's not a question of whether Mint should have the right to do it, but whether they are jerks or not by doing it.
Perhaps, but my original comment still stands in that case.
In my book nobody is a "jerk" if the amount involved is 3,41 USD - unless children under the age of 7 are involved.
- Jesper
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Nobody's arguing over the $3.14, that's just the number that happened to have been donated as of November. It's an ethical question that applies to any possible amount.
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> Nobody's arguing over the $3.14
you kinda "rounded" the amount.
3,41 dollars: that's gangsta.
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He actually rounded more, as it was supposed to be $3.141592..
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I had put the quotes because it wasn't 6.28..
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Switching the digits, though, is acceptable in quite less numeric systems:
III TALLERI ET I PLVS XL CENTESIMI
ID EST PRAEDONEM
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Can't tell if troll or never heard about "17 dollars now that's gangsta"
I should have known a comment like that yields an unnecessarily long thread.
PS: the term Cosa nostra, mafia e padrino is part of my native language...
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What if they ended up becoming popular and actually making decent money? It sounds like it should be spread around a few different groups, no matter how much it is. I use Mint and have donated, but I think it's not really fair for them to take all the donations from a group project.
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They only get the money if people buy music through Banshee. The popularity of the distro isn't directly correlated.
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Well, I personally switched from Ubuntu to Mint a few weeks after they made Unity the default. At that time it was claimed to be the second most popular distro which is why I went with it - because I thought it would still have decent support and updates. I don't care if it becomes "number 1" or anything like that, but it's certainly my favourite OS so far. They've put effort into making it feel polishedl the themes are classy, and I like little details like getting a fortune cookie every time you open a ne
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Well, I wasn't analysing it in depth. I didn't like most of the themes personally, but that's the case with any OS I've used, and I assume that all the ones that made it in must be liked by at least a few people. There are 2 or 3 themes that I really liked, like the default MintX, and the dark grey one with medium blue title bars. The themes and the default desktop backgrounds do have a very "minty fresh" bold quality to them IMO - I think their whole Mint concept works quite well.
I'm going to keep using it
Alright, I take that one (Score:2)
I hereby impose a flat-tax for 3,41 USD per day for every human being not in the western nation to be payed out to the western nations as compensation for all the western tech that benefits non-western people.
Am I a jerk yet?
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Don't forget to pay for the whole time Westerners used Arab technology "al-Jabr" (you know it under a very similar sounding name).
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Banshee was sending their revenues from Amazon purchases to the Gnome foundation. Seems to me that Mint has done more than $3.41 worth of work making Gnome usable again, so why not let them continue for the time being?
It's free software. (Score:5, Insightful)
Because they don't have the right?
It's free software. They have the right to make whatever changes they intercoursing want as long as the end user gets the source code and the right to modify and redistribute it.
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That's legal right. There are others.
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Re:Find a better case for the discussion (Score:4, Funny)
First, if you had actually RTFA, you'd know that they've offered the Banshee developers a better revenue-sharing deal than Ubuntu did ... and they're not saying "take it or leave it or we'll say 'screw you' and disable it entirely" like Ubuntu did when people complained.
Second, affiliate marketing must DIE DIE DIE! Kill it off, and you get rid of a LOT of spam.
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They can be better than Ubuntu and still be wrong...
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Source code is Source code.
Hate the game, not the player.
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Re:Find a better case for the discussion (Score:5, Insightful)
This has EVERYTHING to do with software freedom. Per the GPL what they are required to do once they make their change to the affiliate link is make the source code available.
End of Story.
GPL covers copyright law, not ethics and the human heart. I can download RedHat and recompile with all references to RedHat removed and use Charlie Chaplin and call it the I-Hate-Chaplin distro. Does not matter if that is nice or ethical, What it is, is allowable by the GPL.
I think any downstream project has the right to change the revenue stream stuff. As far as I am concerned it is like a TV Commercial, there is a *posibility* that it will lead to revenue, not a guarantee. The only thing they have to do is make the source code available. Beyond that, I would say if there is a graphic or text that says donations, or purchases go back to the project, that stuff should be removed or changed to reflect who it is going to. if it is not mentioned at all, then "Mint" and anyone else is free to do what they want.
The current situation is interesting enough. What happens if the upstream affiliate code is out of date or broke? What if it causes the software to throw errors? Is it still sacred at that point?
It would be "nice" if no one ever hijacked the link. It would be "nice" if they shared revenue. But they are not required to. RMS put nothing in the software freedoms about not tampering with upstream revenue. Being a dick is showing a picture of Jerry's Kids and saying that all purchases via the music store for the month of January will go to MDA and in reality you are just pocketing the money yourself. Modifying links in the source code is what downstream projects do. Deal with it.
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Per the GPL what they are required to do once they make their change to the affiliate link is make the source code available.
We're not talking about what they are required to do, but what they should do.
GPL covers copyright law, not ethics and the human heart.
But we're not talking about the GPL, but about ethics.
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Well then if we are talking ethics why are we running Mint anyways?
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"Clem has made anti-semantic remarks"
Proof or shut the fu*k up.
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Anti-semantic. Not supporting the state of Israel is now anti-semantic ? He is offering peaceful protest. No more, no less.
What rubbish. Is someone who, for example votes against the current Government in Israel now anti-semantic ?
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Clem has made anti-semantic remarks
Anti-semantic. Not supporting the state of Israel is now anti-semantic ?
He is offering peaceful protest. No more, no less.
What rubbish. Is someone who, for example votes against the current Government in Israel now anti-semantic ?
Sorry, but ignoring missiles launched from school yards into entire Israeli neighborhoods and blowing a fuse when Israel bull dozes the single house that produced those missiles is what I'd call anti-Semitic. You may call it a double standard, and you'd be correct, but you would have a hard time making the case that it is not caused by Clem being blinded by antisemitism.
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What they should do, is turn around and submit their change upstream.
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Maybe you should ask that question to Brian Proffitt (the author of the article), since the question was asked by him. From TFA:
But did the Linux Mint team do the right thing by appropriating the affiliate revenue for themselves?
Personally, I would just like to suggest that maybe there's more to ethics than having legal permission.
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Maybe you should think for yourself before entertaining every stupid idea you read on the Internet as if it had a point. There's no question of ethics here. When the creators gave permission for anyone to modify and redistribute their code they also gave permission for them to change the affiliate codes used. How is that at all unclear?
Of course they have the right if they authored it (Score:2)
If someone authors a piece of open source software, they have every right to try and make money with it. The distributions have the right to try and make their money selling packaging, security, and update services. It would be an extremely rude and blatant theft for a distributor to rewrite the code in the software to steal the revenue, no matter how great or small that revenue stream might actually be.
Personally I prefer to structure my software so it can encourage use of a service provider model for
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Yeah, but Mint didn't write the software, Banshee did. Mint is the distributor.
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Well, then certainly Canonical didn't author the software either. In theory, this is how open source software is supposed to work. The software's free, and you're free to try to make a buck packaging it and providing a better, more stable or more up-to-date experience. Mint isn't doing anything to Canonical. They're both doing what distros do. Now, whether this is a formula for making lots of money is still an open question. And if the writers of Banshee start feeling cheated out of their 'deserved' c
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This has nothing to do with software freedom. It's not a question of whether Mint should have the right to do it, but whether they are jerks or not by doing it.
If I remember correctly, the last time I used Mint (years ago), it was set up in such a way that the income gleaned from the Google searches from the default browser, Firefox, went to Mint and NOT Firefox. I also seem to remember that there was no way of changing this.
Actually, after a bit of research, it appears that it's worse. From reading this, it looks like Mint has its own search engine option that it has slipped into Firefox. HERE [linuxmint.com] is a writeup on it. HERE [linuxmint.com] is the official Mint word on the whole th
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Yeah, I mean, you cannot pay for a photo with Richard Stallman for $3.41
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In the 'what is your time worth' category, the amount of money spent just posting this to /. and having eyeballs look at it is WAY WAY more than $3.41.
(me typing this in is likely more than that).
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I do spend a bit of time making sure my thoughts are down properly. Too many comments that come out wrong because I wrote faster than I thought. Also had to wait for the preview to come up, make sure I didn't type anything wrong.
And no, I don't make $289/hour, but I do make a pretty decent amount. Meaning I should get back to work.
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Control? (Score:3)
I am confused?
Why would they have control of that in the first place?
If Mint owns Banshee, and Canonical and GNOME do not, then they should get the revenue.
And if they are able to change the code then does that non demonstrate that they have the right to?
And even if money should be shared with those other two, if Mint is the primary owner would it not make sense for it all to go to them and then they split it up themselves.
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Just because something is legal does not mean it is socially desirable behavior. I wouldn't choose to legally prevent them from changing the code in this way, but that isn't the question. The question is, is it polite to do so? Are they being rude?
Classic big business blunder. It's legal, and it increases our profit, so it must be the right thing to do.
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just having a ref coded store link in a foss app is.. well. dunno, counter foss. it's pretty obvious thing to change if you do the distribution for the app anyways, even more obvious if you do some changes to the app.
maybe it wouldn't be so bad if they had a config option for changing it to whatever and had some popular projects as preconfigured choices?
though honestly banshee shouldn't have implemented it in the first place.
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I'm not trying to snark, but please clarify: How is just having a ref code counter FOSS in your opinion? Do you find something wrong with a FOSS project raising money?
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just having a ref coded store link in a foss app is.. well. dunno, counter foss. it's pretty obvious thing to change if you do the distribution for the app anyways, even more obvious if you do some changes to the app.
I do rather agree with this.
maybe it wouldn't be so bad if they had a config option for changing it to whatever and had some popular projects as preconfigured choices?
That would've definitely been a better change. And instead of wondering whether or not it was ethical, I'd be fully behind it. As it is, given that the ref code exists, I can't decide if they were being rude or not by changing it, but still not making it configurable in the UI.
Excerpt from changelog (Score:3)
- public const string REDIRECT_URL = "http://integrated-services.banshee.fm/amz/redirect.do/";
+ public const string REDIRECT_URL = "http://redir.l
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Answer #1. No. Answer #2. No.
Here's another question: Is it socially desirable behavior to impose 'social obligations' which directly contradict the terms and conditions of the license selected by an author of the program?
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Pick a different license. Don't hide the ball. Don't explicity grant permission to do something and then complain when someone does it. That is socially undesireable behavior. If you can write complex computer code but can't figure out how to create a custom license rather than burying a contradictory comment within the source, that verges upon being rude.
I disagree. For example, such a license would prevent the overall beneficial change of making the referral link user-configurable.
I still prefer highlighting when someone does something questionable and making sure people are aware so they can choose whether or not to be OK with it. Perhaps Mint will do the right thing now and fix it to be user configurable. Perhaps this will spawn a fork of Linux Mint that does the right thing.
Not all behavior that is considered appropriate or ethical can or should be enco
Re:Control? (Score:5, Insightful)
Isn't this what Open Source code is about. You put the code out there and allow anyone to tinker with it, as long as they give the tinkered code away? I could download Linux Mint's version and program it to deposit all proceeds into my bank account and make my own Distro called "Make me $0.50 Linux" and as long as I offer my code changes up, there is little that can be done.
It may be legal, but it sure isn't moral (Score:2)
The law does not legislate morality and cannot prevent greed by downstream distributors of a software package. However, it's PR suicide for a distributor to modify code to steal the paltry revenues generated by most OSS packages. That's effectively saying we're not satisfied with taking your free code homework, we want your lunch money, too.
And for a software distributor to do so (not the author) is as rude and socially unacceptable as any other bullying thief's behaviour.
"Mint-diverting banshee"? (Score:2)
How does one make money with a mint-diverting banshee?
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Let the users choose... (Score:2, Insightful)
really, would it be that hard to let users choose?
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Sure, they just need to install Banshee from their PPA instead of the Mint mirrors. But it's common knowledge that most people don't care and will use the defaults.
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It is also common knowledge that most people do not purchase their music via Banshee.
Since most folks will never purchase music this way, there is not much point in them being concerned in who gets the revenue.
Re:Let the users choose... (Score:5, Interesting)
If I had mod points...
"Thanks for running Banshee... From time to time online transactions generate a small amount of commission.
Where would you like any proceeds to go to:
[ ] Canonical
[ ] Mint
[X] Cancer Research Charity
[ ] A.N Other Charity
"
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Exactly. The only sane way to resolve conflicts like this is to let the users choose (and provide smart defaults).
By "smart" I mean something that doesn't disadvantage any of the choices.... off the top of my head, an interface something like the Humble Bundle, perhaps equal or random distribution of money to start and randomize the order of choices. Then record (anonymously) the choices of anyone who adjusts the defaults and start setting the defaults according to general community preference once enough s
Nothing really (Score:5, Interesting)
Okay, lets simplify this for all that don't want to read the articles.
Banshee's own link is dead so Canonical replaced it with their own in Ubuntu.
When Linux MINT saw this in the changelogs while repackaging, they did the same thing replacing it with their own.
I'm sure both would change this back if Banshee upstream started accepting donations again.
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According to the article, the link is not dead (even though Mint thought it was). It just works only from within Banshee.
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Whatever the facts about what has happened here, the question has still been raised, "how should revenue be shared between upstream and downstream FLOSS projects?"
So let's just look at it as a hypothetical: CompanyA has a revenue stream from an Amazon affiliate program. CompanyB takes CompanyA's project and includes it in their own product, according to proper licensing terms. Can CompanyB simply change their referral program so that they receive the revenue, or do they have a moral/ethical/legal respons
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I'm sure both would change this back if Banshee upstream started accepting donations again.
May be Banshee is no longer an Amazon Affiliate.
The biggest victim here may be Amazon, which would have just kept that money if no one took it. I feel bad for Amazon.
They Don't Need It (Score:5, Funny)
Who cares? (Score:3)
The folks writing Banshee released it with a Free license of their own free will. As long as Mint or Canonical or whoever complies with the terms of the license, what difference does it make? It's not like the little commission was part of the license agreement. If Mint wants to repackage Banshee as "The Banshee Sucks" media player and send all income from it to support Alfred E. Newman for president, it's their business.
Re:Who cares? (Score:5, Interesting)
More importantly, who cares about Banshee? Okay I know a lot do since it's popular but I can't seriously understand why would you want a media player running on mono with the slugginess that such implies, with silly album galleries that hardly match the way we listen to music today and that pointlessly tries to also manage video file without actually making the commitment to being a media center.
The album galleries drive me crazy, this is almost as bad as the physical bookshelf in the iPad. Music players these days are search based *because* it was realised that music can be grouped into more categories than what physical disc they were published in. The files don't need to be in an specific hierarchy nor in the same computer any more.
Yet that doesn't make for pretty thumbnails, and because everything must be thumbnails banshee presents music in little graphical boxes with a thumbnail of a CD case that you probably don't have, successfully reproducing the experience of browsing a physical music library from 1995 in 2011!
I have my complains about Rhythmbox but exactly what has Banshee (or Exaile) that Rhythmbox doesn't?
I'm just shocked (Score:4, Informative)
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I like banshee. It resolves the track details and album art of CDs I rip, supports a wide range of formats, copes well with my large music directory and its file and directory name conventions, has working gapless playback (rhythmbox's never quite worked right whenever I tried), and integrates well with last.fm.
I didn't even know it was built on Mono until a couple of weeks ago. I haven't noticed any sluggishness, and I'm not running it on a terribly fast PC.
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You mean he's not the Republican front-runner??
The truth is out (Score:2)
Though a trivial amount of money ($3.41 in November 2011)
Lately, all one hears about is how Mint is more popular than Ubuntu and the top distro on Distrowatch. Well, maybe the trivial amount of money taken through Banshee shows how popular the distro really is.
Woah... (Score:2)
People still BUY music!?
Whatever happened to that confunded P2P thing that everyone was crazy about a couple years back?
illegal? (Score:2)
IANAL, but if you make the following assumptions:
- amazon.com is a market
- referral codes are equivalent to affiliate advertising for that market
then a 3rd party that alters a piece of software without the user or developers consent (deception) in order to redirect such a revenue stream for their own benefit (fraud) is committing a computer crime which may result in a fine, imprisonment, or both. in california, at least.
This is the kind of behavior we expect of spyware, browser bars &c.
Does the number o
Thunderdome (Score:2)
they should all fight gladiator style over the $3.41 two projects enter one project leaves.
Re: (Score:2)
I agree! The first time the program is run, it should pop up a box and and give the user a choice!
ttyl
Farrell