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Chinese Linux Developers Allegedly Violating Licenses 221

Posted by CmdrTaco from the who-knows-where-this-will-go dept.
sasha328 was among several to submit a story about problems with Chinese Developers allegedly violating licenses by not re-releasing their mods to various open source projects. There's not a lot of evidence presented, but a lot of points made without telling us what code and what license. But I'm sure we'll see more of this in the future.
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Chinese Linux Developers Allegedly Violating Licenses More

Chinese Linux Developers Allegedly Violating Licenses

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  • Mind Your Own Fucking Business (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    We've had reports of racial profiling in the USA, female inmates raped by corrections officers, peaceful black immigrants beaten and shot for getting their wallet out, high school students shooting each other, Japanese fishing boats destroyed by American subs, bombing the Chinese embassy, government politicians having affairs with interns, a mother drowning her five children one by one...damn where do I stop?

    Nobody is forcing Nike or Hasbro to use overseas labor. Perhaps there is a reason companies use cheap labor. Study economic development before you open your shithole. If you want to do something about it, don't buy items made overseas and write to your elected officials. I'm sure they'll do all they can when they're not busy screwing interns, smoking pot or getting C's in Yale. Peace, nigga!

  • 5 billion poor vs 250 million americans... (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    eeh. Dumbass, America really is more important than the rest of the world. We consume more and buy more than anyone else. We buy somewhere along the lines of 40% of the Earth's goods. We kick ass, and when you take away our buying dollars you basically face shit-storm poverty.

  • I'm the anonymous coward who posted the message you replied to.

    I did live in the East in my youth, and I learned this: I will never be wise enough to have a good opinion about China. One day, I would meet the kindest people, who would give me dinner and teach me games, overcoming my shyness. The next day, I would be attacked in the street and treated like an animal.

    My post went: You can try for cultural transferrance... but that's just patronizing. The '...' part was (e.g., Chinese are really undeveloped Westerners with a bad government and different faces). The meaning was that it's unjust to apply Western standards to Eastern society.

    On the whole, though I disapprove and say that I disapprove of Chinese culture, I'm very nice about it. I write, Simply put, Chinese have [a sucky culture] when viewed from a Western perspective. If it helps you, I don't say this because I hate communism or Chinese people. I say this because nobody ever gives Western culture credit for its major strength, which is individual freedom and recognition of single people as valuable. It's always zen this, acupuncture that, exploitive British something else, white man's burden this and that. There's a tangible good mixed into the whole Western problem.

    You, as an Easterner, can point out how Westerners were still burning cows as witches while China had already enjoyed 2000 years of enlightened civilization. As Robert Bly says, Follow your bliss.

  • Read the Article (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    The article wasn't very negative, hell, I'd say it was rather promotional. Read it carefully and you realize it is a mild critisism, not an out right accusation.

  • $12 a year? Either you left out a K or the Chinese economy is _much_ worse than I thought it was...
  • China never was communist... It's always been an almost monarchical dictatorship acting under the guise of communism...

    Well, if you want to say it's capitalist, despite the fact that most of the so-called "capitalist" economy there, and all of the important bits, like telecommunications, are owned by the government, or the party (same thing) or the army (same thing)... I guess it's one of those dividing line things; communists like to think a system could have majority government ownership and control of the means of production and still be capitalist instead of communist. Capitalists don't. I'm more inclined to believe the capitalists about this than the communists.

  • You're forgetting something -- it's OPEN SOURCE. And one of the greatest features of the GPL is that it prevents someone from stealing someone else's hard work and making money off it.

    There is NO LEGAL WAY these people or companies can close up the source and sell stolen open source programs in the United States or other US license/copyright treaty member nations (read EU, Japan, etc). And if they just try to sell their program in China, they'll probably receive just as much respect for their license as they showed to for the GPL.

    I realize this is of little comfort to those who put in the hard work, but if you assume their motivation in stealing your source code was to make money, rest assured that they won't see any.

  • Yes, but the point is to share. If I'm interested in one of your build scripts, is it really in the spirit of free software for you to lump it into a binary file 650MB in size and say "yeah, here ya go, it's in there."?

    If I came over to your house to borrow a cup of sugar, would you pack it in a five hundred pound, ten-foot-cubed crate, and tell me I'd need to take the whole thing? Even if you professed to be part of a food-sharing movement?

    I know, it's a lousy analogy, but it more or less works.

  • Where is this account? I am talking about July 03 2001 not the massive outage.
  • I am sure that several of those who wrote in submited the link from linuxtoday.com. What wasn't that link posted, after all linuxtoday had the story YESTERDAY...

    Also, why was slashdot unresponsive for several hours during the US afternoon?
  • Nope, only to people you give the binaries to have the right to obtain the source.
  • Nope, only to = Nope, only the
  • Why get all up in arms over this? Its *going* to happen, and you cant exactly use a US court to force anybody in other countries to do anything, especially over something like the GPL (is it enforceable in court, anyway?) I'd think there would be more important things to devote time and money on, than worrying about people adhering to licenses in other countries that dont even obey copyright laws in the first place..
  • How the Chinese government runs China is the business of exactly one group: the Chinese government.

    Allow me to disagree: How the Chinese government runs China is the business of the Chinese people.

    Now, cultural relativism is fine and all, and China certainly has a lot of unique problems to deal with. But I think there are some cases where the line must be drawn. If the government is deliberately putting its own interests above those of the people it supposedly serves then I for one think the moral imperative to "meddle" exists, at least through non-aggressive means such as lobbying and trade restrictions.

  • You are wrong. Not only did Al Gore invent Linux, he invented China too!
  • It would be better to find out the developers who violate the licenses. If you got modified version of software from Chinese developers, ask them to provide you the source if they haven't done so.

    I certainly think that's a reasonable thing to do.

    Now, if they refuse, that's a real violation.

    This is what I don't understand. Why should China, or any other nation, have to abide by our laws? GPL gets its teeth from US Copyright law and, as far as I can tell, China is not a territory of the US.

  • Hmm, your post got me thinking. By race I was referring to the main branches of the human race, ie caucasoid, mongoloid, negroid, australoid. I read now that even these terms may be considered offensive and/or misleading. And, I concede that one could be racist by insulting a particular ethnic group (for instance, "chink" might be insulting to those who more properly share both mongoloid and caucasoid characteristics.) .. in other words, my race comment was correct but beside the point.

    Still, this person was making a generalization about a nation, not an ethnic group. China is made up of many different ethnic groups [roc-taiwan.or.jp]; so your comment is a generalization and, *according to your interpretation*, potentially racist :|

  • I also question why the Slashdot comment doesn't mention about the practice of RedFlat, that source is coming with the binaries. What a balanced comment!

    RedFlat? Are you implying RedHat is gonna buy out Red Flag Linux? ;) Good strategy! Talking trash about them will drive their stock prices down..

    Seriously, I didn't grok that paragraph at all.

  • (...) in one swoosh of your racist pen.

    Racist? Pah! 'nationalist' maybe. Last I checked, the Chinese didn't constitute their own race. Be careful with those accusations.

  • If the vast majority of the Chinese populace were truly upset about the way things are going, they'd have done somtehing that couldn't be stopped by a few hundred tanks by now.

    They are doing something tanks can't stop ... they're packing their bags and leaving. Everyone in China wants to get out.

  • Uh...how did Canada come into this beyotchi?

  • No racism, not even subtle. "Chinese" is not a race.

    Precise definitions aren't what I care about.. I care about popular definitions.. the ones everyone actually uses.. and the popular definition of "racism" is would definitely include discrimination of any group from a particular country. (Also, Chinese people can definitely be easily physically distinguished from those of other countries, which seems like "race" enough to me.)

    Anyway, my point is that if anyone were to say, "I hate all Chinese people," or, hell, "I hate all Canadian people," no one would hesitate for a second before calling you a racist, and they'd be right to do so.

    You have this backwards. In reality, the civilians of Iraq suffer because Saddam Hussein hates them. The embargo allows for food, medicine, and other supplies, but Hussein has either refused these or hoarded them for himself.

    Which of course why conditions in Iraq have fallen drastically since before the war, when Hussein was already in power, why many top UN officials have resigned in protest of sanctions, why even Bush is trying (though not hard enough) to create "smarter sanctions", which means even those most in favor of sanctions recognize that there are problems.

  • Right on.. We're already scapegoating China, let's not scapegoat the US as well.
  • Uh.. yeah.. the Chinese gov't is going to see a random individual on Nightline saying something negative and HUNT THEM DOWN? Actually, amazingly enough, there is quite a bit of dialogue about changes needed to the government in China, especially in Hong Kong, without any smackdown. The gov't pretty much only cracks down on really popular dissidents these days, which is certainly still a bad thing, I agree, but your average citizen voicing discontent is hardly in any danger of harm. I just want to state the facts here, having been there recently and having relatives there.
  • One thing people forget when they cavalierly talk about the importance of letting the local population decide their freedom is a little something called the American Civil War.. The North wouldn't let the South secede.. and actually DID go to war over it. I personally don't really have an opinion on the Taiwan issue, but I just want to point out that secession is rarely a simple issue.
  • You are right, Afghanistan is completely fucked up too. But that's a religion based thing, right?

    Yes and no. I mean, it was religion-based in the same sense that witchhunts and the Spanish Inquisition were.. That is, religion is just an excuse for selfish behavior.

    China for the most part doesn't value human life because they choose not to, not because God tells them not to.

    I think it's far to simplistic to say "China doesn't value human life." The line the Chinese gov't feeds is that what they do is needed for "stability", that "having food and shelter is an even more basic human right". Yes, this is in large part bullshit, but it does have some merit.. Look at the collapse of the Soviet Union. Russia has been in deep shit, in part because of the lack of stability caused by the collapse.

    The upshot is that there is a balance between moving toward more ideal human rights and dealing with practical problems, between short-term and long-term goals. I personally think the Chinese gov't should focus on long-term goals much more than they currently do, and I agree that many of the human rights abuses are extremely excessive and counterproductive, but to say that the gov't doesn't value human life is going too far.

  • Hey, fuck Iraq too. I'm tired of paying $2 a gallon so some Oil kingpin can have another hooker and a line of coke.

    Please read my post again.. My whole POINT is that by embargoing Iraq, we punish NOT those kingpins, who have plenty of money anyway, but the CIVILIANS, who have done nothing wrong!

    The whole POINT of my post was precisely to show that by making statements like "fuck Iraq", you're condemning no one but the innocent, that you need to separate the government of a country, especially when it's not very democratic, from its people... That just because Hussein's a bastard, and there are Arab terrorists, you don't condemn the population of the whole country and the whole race.

  • Proponents of free software compare proprietary software to communism. Likewise, proponents of proprietary software liken free software to communism.

    Now we finally know which behavior is more in line with communism, seeing actual communists engaging in it. :)

  • Chinese law doesn't support IP, and therefore the GPL is uneeded there. Isn't this what all of you want eventually?

    Not quite. If copyright didn't exist, there would still be the problem of binary-only code. The absence of copyright would remove most, though not all, of the reasons why some assh^H^H^H^Hindividual or group would want to keep a user base hostage with binary code.

  • Only the stupid and the woefully uninformed could possibly argue that the Communist Party does not serve the people - especially when 63 million of those people are members!


    Assumming that there are as many as 63 million members of the party, that number constitute only 5.25 percent of the Chinese population. That's an elite.

    Political participation in the US, while quite low, is probably quite a bit higher than 5.25 percent.
  • If the Chinese government wanted to promote Linux as an economical alternative to Windows, they picked the wrong operating system. A closed source OS might have allowed surveilance and protected against improper use of cryptography. Free software allows individuals to discover such additions and remove them.
  • Finally, someone on Slashdot who recognizes that the GPL has a 'spirit', and that this isn't all about playing lawyer.

    There are so many companies right now who pay lip service to the free software movement but hew strictly to the wording of the GPL, bending it wherever possible, that I was beginning to worry that everyone was missing the point.

    When you can only get someone's source and build scripts in a 650MB CD image, it seems to me they're not paying attention.

  • A country which doesn't respect intellectual property laws is found not respecting the GPL.

    Really?

    Wow, and not too long ago people were all applauding China's adoption of Linux. Didn't realize that it was solely because they could get something for nothing without being accused of piracy?
  • I highly doubt that the additions are "backdoors" put in by the government. O/S allows you to look at the code and see what's inside. Why the hell would the Chinese add shit only to have their people get the "virgin" copy?

    I believe that they should merge their code base w/the rest of the world, but if they really want to do it. Fine. They are ignoring the vasy majority of the rest of the world and continuing to use their outdated and unacceptable government structure, why should they keep up w/anything else?

  • Quite humorous given that the GPL philosophy [gnu.org] epitomizes communism [colorado.edu] (pure communism rather than some of the distorted types that have occurred on this planet. It is always interesting seeing GPL advocates frothing at the mouth when they see the term communism associated with the GPL when that is exactly the sort of ideology that it promotes, and Mr. Stallman is a modern-day Marx-wannabe). So here apparently you have the people who supposedly live under the ideology ignoring it when it serves their purpose. How surprizing.

  • See, this is the type of attitude that I think is very dangerous.. Why claiming to be arguing for the welfare of Chinese people, you're clearly mocking Chinese people. "Oh, can you respond? No? Ha! See? Yo mama.. er.. I mean Your country sucks!" is basically what you're saying.

    It bothers me that this bashing of the Chinese gov't, which does many bad things, starts turning into a subtle form of racism, as this badness is associated with anything and anyone Chinese. "The Chinese gov't sucks! Embargo them!" Do you think that's the best thing for the Chinese people?

    Because of our hatred of Saddam Hussein, we embargoed Iraq, and the Iraq civillians are the ones who really suffer.. Who are we really protecting and punishing here?

    Fact is, there are tons of proxy servers that Chinese people use to get around the firewalls. Ordinary people in China are working hard to find practical solutions to the problems there, while we Americans just use the whole country as a punching bag.

    You want to see human rights violations? Look at Afghanistan, where Ph.D.-wielding women have been reduced to prostitution because they're not allowed to work, where men aren't allowed to treat female patients, but where women aren't allowed to be doctors... Look at any number of African countries where genocide is still rampant (and often fundamentally caused by imperialism).

    Yeah, China has problems, but this scape-goating and hate-mongerinig is so McCarthy-esque it's scary.

  • China never was Communist. It's always been an almost monarchial dictatorship acting under the guise of Communism. Hell, the economy there these days is pretty much completely capitalist. And I doubt the developers they're talking about here are acting under specific directions of the government. "You must flaunt the capitalist pig licenses or else!" And if violating the GPL is high on your list of objectionable activities by the Chinese gov't, you obviously don't know much Chinese history. I stopped trying to understand humans after learning about the Cultural Revolution, the Greal Leap Forward, Mao's bloodthirsty lunacy in almost all respects, witnessing the Tiananmen Square Massacre first-hand, etc etc.
  • They only need to release the code to people they distribute to, and then only if customer ask for the sourcecode. They don't have to make the source publically available. They don't have to roll the mods back to the original kernel.

    So, what exactly is the problem?
  • Executing people for committing terrible crimes is the only way of making sure they will never do it again. BTW. People in US support death penalty so it is the law. End of story.

    Right you are. Also, in Afghanistan, they realize that executing women who are suspected of being unfaithful is the only way to keep them from doing it again. People in Afghanistan support the death penalty so it is the law. End of story.

  • But I'm sure we'll see more of this in the future.

    More condemning articles with little evidence pointing fingers and posted to /.?

    --
  • I have the feeling that this claim may not be fair to Chinese developers (Note: I'm a Chinese)

    It would be better to find out the developers who violate the licenses. If you got modified version of software from Chinese developers, ask them to provide you the source if they haven't done so. Now, if they refuse, that's a real violation. Before someone have done that, the claim is not justified at all. I really want to see a case like that, and someone bring it to the court in Hongkong/China/Taiwan/etc.. and test the GPL over that side.

    I also question why the Slashdot comment doesn't mention about the practice of RedFlat, that source is coming with the binaries. What a balanced comment!
  • Picking my words here carefully to avoid the wrath of Godwin ;-)

    Late '30s Germany had a system called 'Blockwardens'. Essentially, they littered the area with party supporters who were under instruction (and paid) to mention pretty much everything that people were saying and doing to area handlers. Stub your toe and cry out in anguish against the government and you would be reported if they heard.

    They were totally anonymous.

    Net result, you had no way of knowing where or when you could say something possibly irritating to the government - anyone could be the blockwarden and so could get you in to trouble. About as close to a thought police as you can get.

    I honestly don't know anything substantial about Chinese politics or society - but, with this sort of system, you can shut off dissent very effectively. If you can't discuss you can't organise. If you can't organise then how can you get any movement of opposition going? The net might be able to help a little (still very vulnerable, though) but how many Chinese have unfiltered net access?
  • "Patriots" are always free to do that sort of thing - this, though, made sure they had someone getting regular updates from particular people. Memory says they were paid but I'm not 100% certain.

    In case anyone wants to do any research, they were known as 'Blockleiters' in German.
  • I highly doubt that the additions are "backdoors" put in by the government. O/S allows you to look at the code and see what's inside. Why the hell would the Chinese add shit only to have their people get the "virgin" copy?

    What makes you think the powers-that-be in Red China would let their people have access to unadulterated Linux? You're forgetting that they control the horizontal and the vertical...nothing gets past their "Great Firewall" that Mao wouldn't approve. The few people who get to travel outside the country might be able to snag a regular Linux distro in their travels, but the only people who would have that opportunity would be those who have already proven themselves loyal to the current regime.

  • > Would YOU want an iliterrate to vote for the president?

    Well, today; no need to be litterate to vote: you just need to know where to punch the hole...

    > Not that i'm saying China is full of uneducated people,

    Not that I'm saying Florida is full of myopic geezers...

    > but overall the people in USA are relatively more educated and have more experience with these "rights" and so they are more ready to use these "rights" without causing problems.

    Campaign financing *cough* lobbying *cough* two-party system *cough* all-powerful corporations *cough*. If people really were more prepared to use their rights, they'd vote Libertarian or Green. But maybe that's what you'd call "causing problems"...

  • Actually, it is of great priority. Quite frankly the US needs China, and China needs the US (Ditto for all other nations in the world, see "For Whom The Bell Tolls". We all need each other).

    However, the majority of US citizens feel that there are certian basic human rights that ought to be met by everyone. We generally won't mess with another country, but we can force them to make certian decisions due to the fact that they need our business to thrive economically. It would be the same as other nations refusing to trade with us (or limiting, or tariffing, etc) because we don't have vey strict emissions standards, or because we have nuclear arms, etc.

    I'm proud of the USA, and am glad to be here. Sure, there are things I disagree with that the nation does both externally and internally, but that's the price I pay for choosing to live in a semi-democracy (republic or 50 states, which are also ruled as republics. We could go to a democracy if we wanted, now that the needed speed and bandwidth of communications are in place, but that would also entail a lessening of our anonymity and privacy).

    At any rate, don't think of us as bullying you. Think of it as you scratch our back, we'll scratch yours, and don't touch the other nations that have treaties with us.

    IANAPSM (I am not a political science major)

    -Adam

    Prepare to don flame suit
    Donning flame suit...3...2...1...
    Flame suit engaged and operational.

    This sig 80% recycled bits, 20% post user.
  • They also printed this on the chinese slashdot site here [linuxfab.cx] for those who can read.


    I personally see the culture gap between the mainland chinese mindset than the american mindset. Many among the americans actually don't view financial gain as their number one priority in life, however, in the mainland, where generations have suffered far far below the "american" poverty level for decades, or even centries. Making money now become the primary factor in gaining respect or "face" in the increasingly materialistic nation.


    Hong Kong, on the other hand, has always been the most materialistic of the three, until recent years where China seems to be surpassing them in terms of finacial dense populations. Money has always been important, and it is needed to follow what is "in" in the popular culture, where Linux and being an "IT" person is so hip. Although there are still many linux using geeks here (like HKLUG, cuhk linux geeks! We put Fast CangJie chinese input method v6 in Linux!!!) the population as a whole follows the latest buzz and fad.


    Taiwan has always been a major world player in computer, especially in the hardware side (hey, who do you think wrote all those optimized windows drivers that are closed source? ;) and they are considered to be the software giant in se asia, due to their decades of experience in software development. Almost all windows based software that supports chinese are writen in Taiwan. They have a strong culture that is not as material based. Even on the linux scene, they have been the contributors to major i18n efforts, such as Chinese Linux Extensions (CLE), many localizations for desktops. There are many supporters of open source here (gnu, rather than bsd for some reason). Some even set up many /. style sites, like the one above where people talk about politics and open source (minus the first posts...). The goal of these projects is to give chinese hackers a decent environment to operate in, and to give freely to anyone who wishes to use it, instead of microsoft.

    I think that even if chinese developers violate these licenses, there is really nothing the west can do. But I just like to point out that not all developers are doing this, and the open source movement in the east is getting stronger, with more people learning to code and learning about open source. Only time will tell us.

  • You could say this is cirsumstancial evidence but:

    A while ago I had to interview a recent immigrant from China for a position at my company. On his resume he had said at his previous job he 'improved' the USB driver code in the Linux Kernel so that it would work better with their systems.

    Before the interview I did a grep through the kernel to see if I could find his name or any derivative of the name, I found none. So I asked him about it, and why he wasn't on the contribution list.

    His answer (and I'm going from memory), was that since it was done for his employer he wasn't allowed to release it back under the GPL and it was propritary.

    From my limited understanding, they do sell their systems (with linux and the mods), and they don't release any source code with them. The system is limited to back end phone networking use, and only in China so it really hasn't come to light.

    Take that as you like, while it isn't exactly proof, and I see this as more of a bad coporation then as something 'China specific.' But doing kernel mods and not releasing them back under GPL does happen.

  • I really don't care what the actual ratio is, but I have seen first-hand pallets full of fake product ready to be distributed to various "expos" where unbundled wares and other stuff is laundered like regular semi-used product.

    I've always figured that "shelfware" balances "fakeware." By "shelfware", I count all the unused copies of Microsoft products that were preinstalled but then deleted, or bought for an employee as a package but never actually used, for example.

    I imagine the fakeware and the casual copying mostly just balance out this picture, but I don't have numbers to back this up.

  • If the BSA figures of "1 in 3" pirated applications being used today are anywhere near correct, do you think it's because corporations can't afford software?

    No, it's because they figure that nobody will catch them ignoring the licensing issues.

    China is only one of the large producers of fake Microsoft products. Fake Adobe and Autodesk and Macromedia products, as well, but fakes of these are a little harder to spot.

    As a producer of any fake products, like Rolexes and Gucci items, they do it because there's a market for it.

    But Open Source is free-as-in-beer, so why would they circumvent the licenses? The thicker the cultural apathy, the more prevalent it will be. They don't care about Western license law, they just grab what they can use, and use it. There are plenty of people in the USA and Britain and Canada and Australia who don't care about Western license law, so people in Eastern and Middle-Eastern and Latin-American and African countries are going to care even less.

    Capitalism and Opportunism are often confused, so anywhere that capitalism is sprouting... opportunism thrives.

  • I don't see how either human rights or software license abuse can be of any priority of yours if you don't live in China.

    To paraphrase: "I don't care about anything that's not in my country". You must be american, right?
  • ...and this would have created a blackhole destroying all the universe...

    Be realistic. I don't approve Iraq invading Koweit, but what you say is insane.

    First, not long before the invasion of Koweit, the americans told Iraq "we don't care about happens between you and Koweit", which led Iraq to invade Koweit. There are two interpretations on this: the official is "somebody screwed up, let's blame that person and that's all". The second interpretation is that it was calculated to allow the US to produce the war.

    This war benefited the US. It allowed them to establish bases in Saudi Arabia by convincing them that "we must protect you from the evil Iraq". It also allowed them to test all the new toys (weapons) because there hadn't been any war for a while.

    Also the war was VERY good the the big war industry. I wouldn't be suprised to learn that their lobbying had a lot to do with the Gulf war. After all, there are billions of $ at stake... and YOU have been paying for that.

    Last thing, how do you justify all the US "preventive strikes" on Iraq after the war. Every time, the UN had been against but the US wouldn't listen. People in Iraq got killed in this, and not just military. Of course, one americal life is worth a thousand Iraqi lives, right?

    As for Iraq invading all the middle east and everybody starving, this is just plain ridiculous.
  • The thing is that there's a middle between not caring at all (like the original poster seemed to do) and sending the whole army and killing hundreds of thousands people in Iraq so you can free Koweit (not mentionning the latest "preventive strikes").

    The US is very quick when there is commercial interests at stake and don't care at all when not. Don't believe this? Then why is there no economic relations Cuba because of human rights issues, while they're doing everything to promote trade with China?
  • So, if polls of people in various European countries in 1940 had consistently shown that people were in favour of persecuting Jews, would that have made concentration camps ok?
  • That these guys are acting like a bunch of fucking communists!
  • ...or will it explode as a bloody revolt when The People's pent up anger is released?

    I'd go easy on the assumptions there... I've seen no evidence whatsoever that the average Chinese citizen is a lit firecracker. Are you sure you're not basing that on a Western-centric view which says "they must be pissed off because I'd be pissed off if I had to live like that"? Different cultures, different values. If the vast majority of the Chinese populace were truly upset about the way things are going, they'd have done somtehing that couldn't be stopped by a few hundred tanks by now.


    --Fesh

  • I'm not sure yet that I agree or disagree with the death penalty... But that's certainly one take on it. Here's mine (along the same line):

    The level of security needed to positively insure that a convict can never get the chance to repeat the crime they were convicted of (and in the cases of people like Ted Bundy or John Wayne Gacy, their behavior pretty much indicated that they'd do it again if given the chance) would be considered cruel and unusual punishment. That's right, there's no such thing as an escape-proof cell, and the security that would be necessary for even a paltry attempt at desiging one would amount to cruel and unusual treatment of the convict. So by this logic, execution is the only humane (to the convict) way to keep such offenders from hurting others again. Compare that to the treatment of the one guy in Alcatraz who was locked in solitary confinement in total darkness for so long that he had memorized every world series game play by play in a failed attempt to keep his sanity.

    However, I think that the standard used today for applying the death penalty is pretty warped. It amounts to petty retribution, not any sort of regard for the possibility of rehabilitation. I think most death sentences are handed down purely on the basis of emotion, not on any sort of scientific evaluation of any future threat that an individual poses.


    --Fesh

  • Get out in the sticks and it's Lenin time.

    Truly spoken like someone who has never been "out in the sticks" of China. Most rural Chinese don't much bother themselves about politics. Beijing is, literally, half a continent a way, and what happens there is largely irrelevant in their daily lives. And Lenin would never have been pleased with what passes for communism in China.

  • So far I found two misconceptions here: China is being ruled by communism.

    Well, in fact, while China is currently ruled by something calling itself a "communist party", the style of governance bears far more similarity to socialism than anything Marx or Lenin ever envisaged.

    Therefore, Hong Kong, a city of China, is also a communists city. Hong Kong ... runs on capitalism.

    Are we talking about communism as political system or communism as economic system? Being capitalist doesn't necessarily mean you're not communist.

  • They can disrespect human rights human rights if they like, but not respecting the GPL is too much. We must fight to protect software freedom in China and save the GPL! Seriously, as far as I'm concerned, software license abuse in China is not the top priority...

    For what's worth: neither does the US of A. Executing people, even retarted, is against Human Rights. What china does is wrong, but the US of A shouldn't be shouting that hard towards china, but look in the mirror first.
    --

  • To clarify somewhat, least the great majority of United States laws concerning intellectual goods are statutory, not common law. The US pretty well scrapped any common law approach to copyright by granting congress the power to make such laws in Article I, Section VIII, Clause 8 of the Federal Constitution. Today most such laws are federal. States have some statutes regarding intellectual goods, too... UCITA, for example. I know of no common law on the topic; that doesn't mean there isn't any, but there's not much.

    Incidentally, "There is no body of Federal common law separate and distinct from the common law existing in the several states", as Justice Brewer famously quoth in State of Kansas v. State of Colorado, 1907. Brandeis, in Erie R.R. Co. v. Tompkins, 1938, stated that "There is no federal general common law". Taking these together, the astute reader will deduce that there is Federal common law in the United States, just not much. Never trust a lawyer, after all. :-)

    Federal courts, though, really aren't supposed to expand upon the common law of the states, and should only fabricate laws "to protect uniquely federal interests" in the event that statutory or state common law does not apply.

    Mostly, anyway.

    If you're interested, start with a Google search on the Erie Doctrine. If you're really interested, read The Common Law, by Oliver Wendell Holmes.

  • I think Bill Gates is a lunatic, and 20 years from now nobody will even remember his name.

  • Now, I'm all for protecting the fine reputation of the Chinese and lampooning dullards and bigots, but before another do-gooder makes a comment chastizing the original poster for saying the Chinese have no manners, please read the post again!

    The 'they' with no manners is not the Chinese, it's the "Westerners who claim to be working in [everyone's] best interests".

    geez.
  • >First...how in the hell do you 'pirate' something that is free?

    It's free as in not locked up, not free as in free beer.

    To pirate GPLd software, you fork the code, make it closed source, then sell it with extra features for money.

    It's happened before to Richard Stallman. First he heard of it was when people contacted him to support the new features. That went down well. Not.

    And that's why the GPL exists.

    Unfortunately, the GPL is based on copyright law in the West. But the chinese don't have a copyright law, so it doesn't look like it applies there.

    OTOH IANAL
  • You think everyone makes their mods public?

    No.

    Who's going to do anything about it? Nobody.

  • Executing people, even retarted, is against Human Rights.

    Oh, barf me. By whose definition is it against human rights? Polls of people in various countries, particularly European countries, consistently show that people are in favor of capital punishment.


    --

  • oh please, it's the same in Russia as it is in China

    russia....democracy......hahaha.....you're funny, you know that?

    No I didn't. Somebody once told me I was ironic, but I didn't know what it meant.

  • This is the sort of thing that getting into the WTO will change. The Chinese will bind themselves into the world economy and begin to rely more on the freedom of trade. Should they violate other countries' rules, they merely challenge it, boycott their products, and strangle their economy until they finally revolt.

    Communist China's undoing will be economic, just like the Soviet Union's. The question is, will it be with a whimper as they continue to slide up towards capitalism (!= democracy) or will it explode as a bloody revolt when The People's pent up anger is released? The great Russian transition into capitalism is far from over and could still exploded into a scene with Putin's head on a stick and a dictatorship of a few years before settling into something stable (reference South America). The Chinese transition may be something different altogether.

  • We've had reports of racial profiling in the USA, female inmates raped by corrections officers, peaceful black immigrants beaten and shot for getting their wallet out, high school students shooting each other, Japanese fishing boats destroyed by American subs, bombing the Chinese embassy, government politicians having affairs with interns, a mother drowning her five children one by one...damn where do I stop?

    Nobody is forcing Nike or Hasbro to use overseas labor. Perhaps there is a reason companies use cheap labor. Study economic development before you open your shithole. If you want to do something about it, don't buy items made overseas and write to your elected officials. I'm sure they'll do all they can when they're not busy screwing interns, smoking pot or getting C's in Yale. Peace, nigga!

    My God, where do you get the idea that a few nutty American individuals acting against the mores of our society equals the crazy machinations of the Chinese government? Everything you mentioned has been found to be wrong by the American people and everything the Chinese are doing is OK by their government because they have a mind that their people are nothing but ants to be stomped on when they get the whim to do it. Thank God we can at least complain about these things instead of fearing in a corner that we'll be taken behind the shed to have a bolt put through our skull and charged for the slug.

  • We've had reports of fur coats made out of dogs in China, inmate organ harvesting, the peaceful Falung Gong being arrested in droves, students in China being slaughtered, American planes being knocked out of the sky over international airspace, and now skin harvesting of prison inmates. If the atrocities that nation is so far responsible for doing to its own citizens haven't made us shift production of Barbie dolls and Nikes to some other less cheaper part of the world by now, we Americans are a lot more cold blooded worshippers of money than we believe. How many of us Americans would be willing to give up all our little comfortable gadgets or even risk semiconductor prodcution on the island of Taiwan for a statistic as large as 1 billion unfortunate people.

    Our European allies such as France cannot even stomach the sight of starving out Saddam Hussein or Fidel Castro before they give up without a gunshot, so what would happen when you multiply that by 100 to get rid of the Chinese Communists? Maybe that was Milosovich's problem...he hadn't negotiated a contract with Kenner or Keds for guaranteed cheap labor!

  • [sarcasm] Yeah we all know how NONE of the Chinese have any manners. I mean, they're only more respectful of the elderly than us in the west [/sarcasm]
  • I kind of admire China on this one. It's a big, powerful, Asian country that does things its own way, and this just infuriates the West to no end. You can make your little laws and jump up and down as much as you want but at the end of the day, we're gonna do what we want. And you know what? Whether their actions are utlimately right or wrong, at the end of the day, the West always capitulates, always loses face. Why? Because we're greedy bastards who don't want to lose access to their billion customers.

    Please don't interpret this comment as condoning the actions of the Chinese government against its own dissidents and the peoples of other countries, its selling of arms to 'rogue' states, etc. That's not my intent. I simply wish to point out that China does not let the West bully it; if anything, it bullies the West. None of the other Asian countries can make the same claim. (Note: I'm of Indian descent.)
  • Yeah, I agree! Yay for China standing up for itself.

    Retard, did you read the second paragraph of my post? It included this caveat:

    Please don't interpret this comment as condoning the actions of the Chinese government against its own dissidents and the peoples of other countries, its selling of arms to 'rogue' states, etc. That's not my intent.

    I complimented them for showing some balls against Western dictates; I didn't condone their human rights violations.

    By the way, I followed your interesting link. Pretty appalling stuff. Once again, NOT TO CONDONE CHINA'S ACTIONS, but did you notice that all of the skinning was of executed prisoners -- i.e., corpses -- for transplant to burn victims except for one (admittedly gruesome) case where the executed prisoner had not finished dying?
  • Friend, if you want to judge another nation by it's atrocities, you'd damn [cjb.net] well [cnn.com] better [amnesty-usa.org] be [villagevoice.com] sure [shadeslanding.com] that your own nation has a [hrw.org] clean [pbs.org] slate [kent.edu]...
  • We've had reports of racial profiling in the USA, female inmates raped by corrections officers, peaceful black immigrants beaten and shot for getting their wallet out, high school students shooting each other, Japanese fishing boats destroyed by American subs, bombing the Chinese embassy, government politicians having affairs with interns, a mother drowning her five children one by one...damn where do I stop?

    Just to be clear about the intent of your parallel parody of the original post - are you suggesting that the state of human rights in the US are comparable to those in China?

  • Paid-software pirating I can understand. It may be expensive, and not that good. But free-software pirating is horrible!

    There are bunches of people working for free, trying to make a better world for everybody. And then a small group of SOB ignores this whole wonderful thing!

    Why don't they abandon comunist right now? Aren't they the so called best society? Aren't comunism and socialism made to bring rights equality to all? Why are they acting like this?

    GPL do not want to make money, as said Stallmann, enough just for living, and living cheap. And now, a small group from a comunist country violates GPL? I'm stopping trying to understand humans.


    I know we don't know yet what license is being violated. I used GPL just as the most representing license.

  • No I didn't. Somebody once told me I was ironic, but I didn't know what it meant.

    It's like 10,000 spoons when all you need is a knife.
    [+1 for inciting irony flame war]

  • How very open-minded of you. I particularly liked the way you used the word 'they' to label well over a billion people in one swoosh of your racist pen.

  • They probally will release it in peices and leave it to the world to reassmble it. Look at what they did with that spy plane.
  • Mr.White didn't give any evidence. From my expeience, that allegation is completely groundless. For example, the dominant Linux distribution in China RedFlag-Linux (http://www.redflag-linux.com) is open to everyone. You can download the binary cd and source cd for free. If you think that any applications that run on Linux should be open source, you are completely wrong. GPL only applies to GPLed code, not the code that is owned by companies. I worked for two companies in US, I ported proprietary applications and drivers to Linux. None of them are open source. If Mr.White thinks that the respectable Chinese Linux developers(just like the Linux developer in US or Europe) violates GPL, he should be prepared to give evidence before opening his mouth. Unless he can give an evidence, I have to say this is just groundless allegation.
  • It is an typical FUD, RedHat want enter China market,
    And the first thing they need to do is attack China
    Linux Company as possible as they can.

    Anyway, China Linux Company doesn't have an good record
    on GPL. But Chinese Developer obey the GPL rules!
    The next is the Chinese Developer's GPL work list:

    Please see http://www.lids.org , http://www.linux.virtualserver.org
    they are all leaded by Chinese developer, And you can have an look at glibc/QT/gtk/XFree86, Some Chinese
    developer leave their name there:
    glibc:glibc/iconvdata/gb18030.c
    QT:qt/src/tools/qgbkcodec.h
    src/tools/qgbkcodec.cpp
    XFree86 4.10:
    ./xc/extras/X-TrueType/GBK

    We are newbie in linux world, But our chinese developer
    are eager to work under the GPL like all respected hacker have done.

    Please do not mix devloper with the evil commercial company!

  • Erm, aren't the GPL etc. governed by US law? And since when did China subscribe to that?

    It just goes to show that anything other than PUBLIC DOMAIN is not truly free information. And, more importantly, anything other than Public Domain is unenforcable in an international environment such as the Internet.

    The GPL isn't worth the paper it's written on. It presumes a whole heap of US-centric crap which is unenforable outside all but a handful of countries.

    That something as US-centric as the GPL could be written by those who style themselves as "pioneers" of the Internet is very telling. They're not pioneers of anything, they're just Uncle Sam apologists trying to enforce the same old Uncle Sam rules in a world that doesn't give a toss about the US.

    --

  • Re:RTFL (Score:3)

    by Goonie ( 8651 ) <robert.merkel@be n a m b r a . o rg> on Wednesday July 04, 2001 @03:03PM (#108877) Homepage
    If I read the GPL correctly, it's not that either. the relevant section, 3b, says the following with regards to what you must do when distributing binaries if you don't provide the source code with the binary:
    Accompany it with a written offer, valid for at least three years, to give any third party, for a charge no more than your cost of physically performing source distribution, a complete machine-readable copy of the corresponding source code.

    However, you should probably read it in view of section 3c, which says if distributing a binary, you can

    Accompany it with the information you received as to the offer to distribute corresponding source code. (This alternative is allowed only for noncommercial distribution and only if you received the program in object code or executable form with such an offer, in accord with Subsection b above.)

    Now, it all hangs on how you define "any third party". Given the presence of 3 c), I would assume that it would include any subsequent recipients of the binary, but I'm not convinced it extends to "anybody who wants it".

    Go you big red fire engine!

  • Re:British imperialism (Score:3)

    by ToastyKen ( 10169 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2001 @09:19AM (#108878) Homepage Journal
    This is hardly scientific, but I recall watching a Nightline episode where they polled Americans in DC about whether they think Hong Kong citizens would rather be under Chinese or British rule. Over 80% said British rule.

    They then went to Hong Kong and polled Hong Kong citizens, asking them which they'd prefer. Over 60% said Chinese rule.

    Moral: Don't assume you know what the people of a place want if you're not from there.

  • Copyright, China, TRIPs and the WTO (Score:3)

    by Peter Eckersley ( 66542 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2001 @10:23PM (#108879) Homepage
    Erm, aren't the GPL etc. governed by US law? And since when did China subscribe to that?

    The GPL is a grant of license with respect to copyright law. Many countries have copyright laws under which the GPL probably makes some sense (signatories to the Berne Convention, for example), so the expectation is that the GPL will be enforceable there.

    Lots of people here have been saying that the GPL is meaningless in China. China wasn't a signatory to the Berne Convention, and didn't have much in the way of copyright. That is, until recently.

    When China wanted to join the World Trade Organisation, it was forced to sign TRIPs [chinabusinessreview.com]. TRIPs (trade related aspecs of intellecutal property) is a little document designed for Pfizier, Monsanto, IBM, Sony et. al., which enforces 20 year patents, life of the author + 50 year copyrights, restrictions on "compulsory licensing", and DMCA-style anti-circumvention device prohibitions. In perhaps the most spectacular coup for corporatations over the public interest (ever), it was tacked onto the GATT in 1994. In effect, any country which does not believe that their interests are served by such extreme IP monopolies, suffers massive trade sanctions through WTO exclusion (see Braithwaite and Drahos, Global Business Regulation, chapter 7, for more details).

    China, like everyone else, has buckled to this pressure, and is going to want to create the impression that it's trying to follow TRIPs. If someone could actually identify a prima facie deliberate GPL violation in China, they might have some chance of a successful prosecution.

  • Re:And yet another complete surprise... (Score:3)

    by nehril ( 115874 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2001 @05:57AM (#108880)
    according to the article, lots of the "closed source" stuff is application level (i.e. not required to be gpld just because it *runs on* linux.)

    There are indeed a few smaller distro makers that are not releasing source to kernel mods, but this is by no means all of them. China is a big place, try not to paint them all with the same brush.

  • Re:RTFL (Score:3)

    by Salsaman ( 141471 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2001 @02:42PM (#108881) Homepage
    I think you are wrong. I think the GPL requires that the source code be given to anybody who wants it.

  • Um, the GPL is a intelectual property license. As far as I know, it falls into the general catagory of contract law. Every country that I know of has a functioning system of contract law, for the simple reason that it's impossible to do buisiness otherwise.

    The GPL probably makes some assumptions that are more true under US and European law than elsewhere, but it is, fundamentally, a contract. The Code of Hammurabi (1792 BCE) contains enough of the fundamentals of contract law that a time traveler could probably defend the GPL with little else. Of course, there are some assumptions in the GPL that might be a little tough to exlpain in aincent Babylon, but the terms of the GPL are clear enough that you could identify a flagrant violation in almost any legal enviornment.

    Yes, China is a communist country. But, communist or not, it does have a working system of contract law. Keep in mind that China has a large, complex and vibrant economy. They make everything from locomotives to DRAMs. Without contract law, none of this would be possible.

    And I've heard enough about the Chinese government refusing to obey intelectual property standards. This simply isn't the case. While they might make noises and gestures as if they were still communist, the reality is very different. They are signatories of most or all of the international conventions on patents, copyrights and trademarks. It is true that there are plenty of honest-to-goodness software pirates (I hate the using term "pirate") in China, but this is more of an enforcement problem than a legal problem. The government simply doesn't have the resources to investigate and prosecute IP violations the way the US does. That's just a fact of life when your country's per capita purchasing parity is only $3,800.

    Before you go posting about countries you've never visteded and/or know little about, you should do a little homework. I use the CIA factbook. Here's the entry for China [cia.gov].

    --

  • And yet another complete surprise... (Score:3)

    by taliver ( 174409 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2001 @05:34AM (#108883)
    For years we've been hearing of pirated software from China, Hong Kong, Singapore (sp?), etc. Why is it at all a shock that these developers would ignore a "good" license just like they ignore a "bad" one?

  • Much hedging (Score:3)

    by DeadVulcan ( 182139 ) <dead.vulcan@pob o x .com> on Wednesday July 04, 2001 @06:05AM (#108884)

    Just an observation... the article doesn't say outright that developers in China are violating the GPL.

    The strongest language comes from Mark White as "in a sense [this is] going against the ideals and benefits of what made Linux useful to them in the first place."

    I get the feeling that there is no actual violation taking place, just a disregard for the spirit of the GPL, in which case the only course of action is moral suasion (which is exactly what this article is doing).

    --
    Accountability on the heads of the powerful.

  • This headline is offensive.. (Score:3)

    by OpCode42 ( 253084 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2001 @07:07AM (#108885) Homepage
    You shouldn't make sweeping generalisations about people from another country. Thats what they do in Russia.

  • You are all wrong (Score:3)

    by Don Giovanni ( 300778 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2001 @06:02AM (#108886) Homepage
    Nothing much happens in China without the consent of our despicable, foul government that has kept the Chinese enslaved for over fifty years now (not that they were free before, but that's a separate issue.)
    The behavior described in this article dovetails perfectly with our shameful history of dictatorship of the communist party in our country, and their avowed intention to obliterate the free world by any and all means at their disposal.
    If this allegation is true, they are hurting themselves
    more than they are helping. They would have to keep their private forked code separate, and constantly modify and merge with the evolving open code base. In the long run, they would lose the open code base advantages because they would not be able to merge their own forked code.
    Furthermore, if there are secret things being put in, I would imagine it would be backdoors to allow the government the control it seems to need. These "enhancements" are not needed by the community anyway.

    The Chinese can decide that the GPL means nothing in which case the author can sue Chinese companies in jurisdictions where it is respected. If those companies do this in China however I think they will eventually become very weak Linux related companies due to the hostility they are sure to draw.

    Also, keep in mind that these claims are being made by one competitor against another. I'm not saying they aren't true, but the problems are likely being exaggerated to make them sound bigger than they are. For example, no specific case of GPL violating was quoted, just general accusations and assumptions. We need more proof before we should feel outraged.
    People in US and the west have experienced monopolies in IT for last 30 years, such as IBM and Microsoft, and realize that opensource is good. People here have not yet suffered enough because of those monopolies, and we still look at IBM and Microsoft as an example for our own software industry. Let's face it, all the opensource companies are burning their VC money ( or other financial resources), trying to find a good opensource business model, what can you expect from those Chinese opensource companies who don't have nearly as much money to burn? If Red Hat is really interested to open Chinese market, it should put money where its mouth is, and hire some Chinese programmers to work on open-source projects ( btw, $30k USD/year is very good money for programmers in China).
    As a matter of fact, I really like to see that happen. I tried redflag, and the truth is you can not install it if you are not fluent in English, and understand all those OS jargons in English. Linux probably has the best internationalization support, including Chinese thanks to all those programmers in Taiwan and mainland China, but still there are many many programs that are in western(Latin systems) languages only, such as evolution and gedit( menu bar is Chinese, but the content canvas can not display Chinese). I wish I have time to fix all those, which is not that difficult at all. But I graduated from college a while ago, and it is hard to get away from wife and kids nowadays.
    Anyway, I agree that Chinese programmers should contribute more, but keep expectations low, for now, please.

  • This is too much (Score:4)

    by jmv ( 93421 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2001 @05:53AM (#108887) Homepage
    They can disrespect human rights human rights if they like, but not respecting the GPL is too much. We must fight to protect software freedom in China and save the GPL!

    Seriously, as far as I'm concerned, software license abuse in China is not the top priority...

  • RTFL (Score:5)

    by Royster ( 16042 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2001 @06:28AM (#108888) Homepage
    Read the friggin' license, folks.

    The GPL does not require that code be given back to the origional developers. It requires that it be given to the people to whom you distribute the software.

    Basically, they've forked the projects. Big deal.
    Get over it. It's time to move on.

  • Little to be concerned about (Score:5)

    by Martin S. ( 98249 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2001 @06:33AM (#108889) Journal

    IMHO there is little to be concerned about in practice, all the offenders are doing is making life difficult for themselves.

    As each new 'legit' release is made, the piractes will have to retro-fit their own custom changes again, and again and again...

    This will leave those that break the licence terms increasingly behind those that play by the rules of the game.

  • Misconceptions (Score:5)

    by jsse ( 254124 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2001 @08:11AM (#108890) Homepage Journal
    So far I found two misconceptions here:

    China is being ruled by communism. Therefore, Hong Kong, a city of China, is also a communists city. Hong Kong is a Special Administrative Region of China. It has an international financial market and runs on capitalism.

    China and Hong Kong do not respect IP and Copyright. China's law can bypass any license agreement. Pirate copying of copyright software is illegal in China and Hong Kong. Especially in Hong Kong, its legal system is based on common law, same legal system in British and US.

    Furthermore, effective on 1/4/2001, companies and individuals possessing pirated software will be subjected to max. fine of HK$50,000 per copy and jail. Police, with court's warrant, can enter(bash) any place to confiscate computer equipment containing pirated software without piror notice.

    A poor 14-year old boy was just caught for hosting MP3 sites. He was at home while police bashing his door.

    It's true that you can find illegal-copied software everywhere. In Hong Kong police can jail you immediate if you are being caught carrying them. Try showing your collection of pirated software at China's custom, but bear in mind the max. penality for smuggling in China is not just jailing.

    (in an unrelated story, while companies were busy looking for enough legal licenses before new law enforced, Microsoft had raised the price of all Windows/Office software. Those suckers.)

    So, if you planned to come here for cheap pirated software, think about it.

  • big news (Score:5)

    by IanA ( 260196 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2001 @07:11AM (#108891)
    wow, the GPL is being violated in China.. perhaps these are some bigger issues from China:

    Outlaw group is mass killed [go.com]
    tibet situation, caused by China [philly.com]
    see what a Chinese 'criminal' has done to deserve jail [hrichina.org]
    Chinese government illegally harvests organs [nytimes.com]

    obviously a lot of problems exist in China, anyone interested should visit human rights in china [hrichina.org]

  • Re:And yet another complete surprise... (Score:5)

    by Rogerborg ( 306625 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2001 @06:38AM (#108892) Homepage

    Uh, yeah, well said.

    Chinese law and custom does not recognise any intellectual property, including copyright.

    The GPL says "This source is copyright Joe Developer. However, you may copy or modify it if blah blah blah..."

    They'll just stop reading at "This source is copyright". And they have the law (Chinese law) on their side.

  • Like most other things... (Score:5)

    by Waffle Iron ( 339739 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2001 @06:09AM (#108893)
    Linux was actually invented in China over 4000 years ago. They feel that they are justified in violating the GPL today because the original ancient Chinese authors/scholars were not properly attributed for their work.

    (The original punched-parchment scrolls of Linux were illicitly smuggled out of China by spice traders, and centuries later ended up in the archives of an obscure Finnish museum. It's not clear what happened after that.)

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