Steven Penny is forcefully claiming ownership of MIT code

15 pointshagbarddenstore10y ago2 comments

So, someone mentioned to me that Steven Penny is trying to claim the ownership of code which he did not write and code that's released under the MIT license.

So what did he do?

1. Renamed apt-cyg to sage (See commits on the 24th of January https://github.com/svnpenn/sage/commits/master) 2. Filed a DMCA takedown on the original repository https://github.com/github/dmca/commit/28ceb5f8dd70b1a7f92d3f9fae053f039b2883c4

There's a counter-DMCA takedown: https://github.com/github/dmca/commit/e74005839a278219774a8c53fd57c6574b607eb0 The original source on Google Code: https://apt-cyg.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/apt-cyg

So, let's get this to the top so the whole world can see what a major arsehole Steven Penny is.

2 comments

2 comments · 2 top-level

mikael-roos10y ago

Steven Penny had the opportunity to explain his doings:

https://github.com/svnpenn/sage/issues/2 https://github.com/svnpenn/sage/issues/3 https://github.com/svnpenn/sage/issues/4

but choose not to say more than claiming to be the sole developer of apt-cyg.

This apt-cyg project has a history back to 2005, released under GPL by Stephen Jungels (according to the original code) and Stephen is also the owner of the now DCMA:ed GitHub repo.

https://github.com/transcode-open?tab=repositories

When apt-cyg moved from Google Code to GitHub it seems that the license changed from GPL to MIT, most likely a move by Stephen Jungels.

So how can Steven Penny claim rights over apt-cyg? Maybe he did a complete rewrite of the code? One can only guess at this stage.

If he did, feel free to do so, the code was MIT, improve, rewrite, re-label and try to market your version. Thats all in the interest of open source movement. No harm done.

But, it does not seem right, to claim something that has been open source code for more than 10 years. Not even a complete rewrite gives you the power to file a DCMA on open source project.

That does not feel right and such an action can never be a positiv movement for the open source community.

Something is fishy, maybe there is more than meets the eye?

Still, no matter the claim, filing a DCMA on open source code where the project has thousands of active users, well, thats not good for open source.

hagbarddenstoreOP10y ago

Now he's removing and renaming the issues I created regarding this: https://github.com/svnpenn/sage/issues/5

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