Subject: Re: [Nel] Congratulations + concerns

From: "Brenden Towey" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 30 Jun 2001 11:34:30 -0700

Good point.

I haven't looked at the source code at ALL, but the idea behind GPL is that
you only have to GPL your code if you base it on existing GPL code.

So, if NEL doesn't already do this, first you take the GPL code and make a
well-defined API that allows one to separate the "game rules" from the rest
of the package, and release that.  "Hey everyone, look at the spiffy API I
added to the NEL code base.  Please look at it and add it to your GPL code
base if you like it."

Then you take the GPL game rules on the other side of the API, delete them,
and write your totally new rules, using only the API.  Tah da, they are
yours, and you don't have to release your code to anyone.  The game rules
are a separate binary (library, .o file) just like the game data.  Use
dynamically linked libraries if you want more separation.  (But I'm pretty
sure that when compiling proprietary apps (see below) under GNU/Linux, at
least some GPL code gets bound directly in.  Also, the concept of
"contamination" my apply, but hey, we are talking a GAME here.  Do you
really think anyone is going to bother suing you?  Unlikely I think. )

This is the same as developing proprietary apps on GNU/Linux.  GNU/Linux
provides a public, GPL'd API, but the app you write that interfaces to that
API is totally your own.

(I'm pretty sure that when compiling proprietary apps under GNU/Linux, at
least some GPL code gets bound directly in, though this doesn't seem to
bother anyone.  Also, the concept of "contamination" may apply, but hey, we
are talking a GAME here.  Do you really think anyone is going to bother
suing you for GPL license violation?  Unlikely I think, unless you really do
overtly violate the license. )

My 2 cp.

Brenden

-----Original Message-----
From: Yann Morvan <[email-masked]>
To: [email-masked] <[email-masked]>
Date: Saturday, June 30, 2001 11:06 AM
Subject: [Nel] Congratulations + concerns

>Hullo,
>I've been following the development of NEL for
>some time, I haven't been contributing due to lack
>of spare time, but I wanted to congratulate the
>Nel team for their idea and work.
>
>However, I have one major concern with the licence mecanism.
>Indeed, your idea is that what the people will pay for in
>games based upon Nel is content and not code. Saying this, you
>implicitly state that content and code are completely distinct things.
>It is true for the most part (graphics, sounds, AI scripts, background,
>plots etc),
>but I can't convince myself that it applies to the rules of the game,
>for I can't help to think that for efficiency matters they should be
>hardcoded in the different services. (The reason being that because of
>their level of abstraction, using a scripting mechanism would be terribly
>painful and would require a design of the services architecture allowing
>for total flexibility).
>
>I played Ultima Online for 3 years, I read the rantings of lum the mad
>daily, I read the dev boards of currently in development MMORPGs, I'm
>aware of the specificities of the "big three" and all this leads
>me to the conclusion that the rules (i.e. economy system, combat system,
>advancement system etc) are a part of the content at least as important
>as the rest regarding a game's interest (I wouldn't be willing to
>create a MMORPG if I wasn't utterly frustrated by the current trends
>in those games).
>
>Therefore, while I totaly agree that any improvment
>or further development of Nel's features should be shared, I'd
>like you to reassure me about the protection of one's rule system
>in your design philosophy.
>
>Sorry for this long mail and for reviving this probably old and well
>debated issue :)
>
> Yann
>
>_______________________________________________
>Nel mailing list
>[email-masked]
>/mailman/listinfo.cgi/nel

---

From: [email-masked]
Date: Sat, 30 Jun 2001 21:25:55 +0200 (MET DST)

> really think anyone is going to bother suing you?  Unlikely I think. )

You are totally wrong...
Please go and read about LIBRARY and GPL License...

What ever you link to a GPL app MUST be GPL. :)
So you have to publish your source under GPL.

And yes you will be sued... you are using the work of thousand of people and you 
can't share a few stupid lines of code!?!?!?!... 

> provides a public, GPL'd API, but the app you write that interfaces to
> that API is totally your own.

You are wrong again...
From what I understood by a mail from FSF, the only way you have to skip GPL is:
1) Get a License from Nel.
2) Code the whole client under a different license. Unless the Net protocol is 
propietary... that I think it is not the case.

> overtly violate the license. )

No, it is not the same... Please ask a lawyer about it, he will explain it more 
clearly that I can.

IMO if someone violate even a bit the license i set, I will sue him.

Regards.

                  Miguel Angel Blanch Lardin

nuclear cia fbi spy password code encrypt president bomb iran irak korea cuba
Ala yihad mosad kgb free freedom human rights yugoslavia kosovo ebola dna 
 
                    -- Echelon must die --

---

From: Yann Morvan <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 30 Jun 2001 15:59:51 -0400

Well, while explaining his mistakes to Brenden,
you didn't adress my point, which is this:
Though EQ has better graphics and better written
network code than UO, I preffer UO because of its rules,
which yet are hardcoded. 

If it is not possible for me to use Nel
(and share the technical improvments I may
make) without being able to protect my set of game 
rules (which are in no way an improvment to the Nel 
library, being specific to my game), then you reduce
content to superficial things (graphics etc) and customer
service, which have never alone made the main interest of a game
for any gamer with an ounce of taste.
 
So please tell me if there is a solution or if I should
give up using Nel (but then again, please understand that
I totaly agree with the idea of sharing my improvments of
the library).

	Yann

P.S. I understand the passion behind the free software notion, however,
in the very field of MMORPG, the inability to protect your rules -
the spirit of your game - leaves the opportunity to a greater
company, if they happen to be popular, to deprive you of the pleasure
of running your game by draining your playerbase by using its marketing
power. You then end up with the opposite of the reason why you thrive
for free software: people make profit over your ideas because of their
mere initial wealth.

---

From: elijah wright <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 30 Jun 2001 16:26:53 -0400 (EDT)

> So you have to publish your source under GPL.

incorrect.  you are free to link commercial applications with GPL'ed
libraries.  library stubs are an exclusion of sorts to the GPL, as they do
not constitute "extending" GPL-code functionality, but simply using it as
it is intended to be used.

LGPL-licenses are a very workable alternative; perhaps the nevrax team
could countenance dual-licensing any such "rules API" and releasing
parallel versions (with identical code) under both licenses.

elijah

---

From: [email-masked]
Date: Sat, 30 Jun 2001 23:54:03 +0200 (MET DST)

> I totaly agree with the idea of sharing my improvments of

I am in no way related to Nel. 
This is just my opinion as contributor of Open Source.

But I think that you should fix the ethical conflict between using "others" GPL 
code and asking them to protect "your" right for not sharing yours. :-/

> for free software: people make profit over your ideas because of their

Once a american president, perhaps Abraham Lincon, told that a nation that give 
away freedom to get security deserver nor freedom neither security.

So this apply to Open Source, I think that freedom is soooo good that it worth 
to risk to that to happen. And imagine that the case you told happen... you 
would have shown world how good is Open Source that a Lame enterprise has decide 
to use your code to make their game.

Regards.

[ Above is just my opinion, I don't ask you to understand it, not to agree with 
me... ]

 
                    -- Echelon must die --

---

From: Dave Turner <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 02 Jul 2001 10:05:00 -0400

> parallel versions (with identical code) under both licenses.

1.  Do not use the term commercial when you mean proprietary. 
Proprietary is the opposite of Free as in Freedom.

2.  The exception to the GPL refers only to system libraries.

See this for details:
http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl-faq.html#MoneyGuzzlerInc

-- 
-[Dave Turner                              Stalk me:  (215)-545-2859]
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Every day I dream that I'll log on to the channel or walk down the
street or get a phone call and you'll be there.  We miss you, Pug.