 
aitech
Guru. Kneel
join:2000-12-19
Boston, MA
clubs: 
| We need MD5 hashes please!! Hey guys - this accusation of back doors and phoning home are pretty serious, and I think should be the focus of our discussion instead of the back and forth kindergarten discussion of;
no it's legal!
no it's not!
your a thief!
you must steal software!
he can do what he wants!
no he can't!
Anyway - please post MD5 hashes of your PAID alchemy binaries and zip files so we can compare to others. It has already been discovered that 2 persons identical fw version have different hashes, so if we can confirm something is different, we can start picking apart the firms...
If you don't know how to MD5 hash, just google MD5SUM.
Thanks. | |
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Rhobite
Premium
join:2002-02-24
Cambridge, MA
clubs:
| Re: We need MD5 hashes please!! I agree 100%. I haven't been following the debate but I can only assume that it's filled with useless rhetoric and armchair lawyering. If Sveasoft really is embedding unique ID's in firmware and phoning home, not only does this violate the spirit of free software, it also must be clearly stated in a privacy policy. Even Microsoft is open with their customers about how and when their products phone home.
--
Jimmysquid.com - I take pictures. | |
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trparky
Bite My Shiny Metal Ass
Premium,MVM
join:2000-05-24
Cleveland, OH
clubs:
 ·AT&T U-Verse
| Re: We need MD5 hashes please!! That would be nice, even for the public downloads.
Please excuse the following link...
File Comparison -- Includes CRC32, MD5, and SHA1 checksum calculations Free!
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WedgeAntilles250 | |
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Rally1
join:2000-06-12
Irvine, CA
·AT&T U-Verse
| You may need more hashes, but please refrain from, well "spamming" my (and i'm sure others) IM and email with your requests just because I posted on a thread that I happen to use Sveasoft firmware. I presume you are sending everyone this crap. And while it might be for a great cause, do you really need to send it to me twice, esp. when I never asked you to send it at all?
Thank you. | |
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aitech
Guru. Kneel
join:2000-12-19
Boston, MA
clubs:
| Re: We need MD5 hashes please!! I am by no means "spamming" anyone with "crap". If you don't care about the security of your box, or others, and don't care to find the truth out, that's fine.
I sent a few people a request for hashes (and all but you, btw, have responded with them happily) via IM, ONCE. And it was a polite request for a hash.
If you have a problem with it in the future, simply ignore the IM, or if it bothers you so much, send me a message saying that I ruined your week by asking you a question via IM. I don't think everyone cares about what IM's your receiving.
--
1536/384 Covad. 1380/360 actual. 20-60ms pings. Great!!Was a BITCH to install 60+ days and 100+ incompetent moron's along the way, but it's GREAT and SOLID now.. GO NYY!! | |
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Rally1
join:2000-06-12
Irvine, CA | Re: We need MD5 hashes please!! I had a great week thanks!
You sent it via IM and email, that's twice.
It wont happen in the future as you wont IM me again..... will you! | |
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Wills
join:2001-01-03
Port Charlotte, FL
| Before this continues get out of hand.... I think everyone should go to the original thread, scroll all the way to page 10 I think it is, and read what a member posted.
This is the full post from member rwhitby.
quote:
To all those people who are accusing Sveasoft of a GPL violation:
1/ Please take your complaint to somebody who can do something about it. None of the people on this list can do anything about it. Neither can you, unless you sue Sveasoft yourself, or get someone else to sue Sveasoft on your behalf. Unless you are prepared to do that, then all your GPL violation accusations here are hollow and useless. If you really are so concerned about this issue, then take it up through the official channels that can make a difference. This forum is not one of those channels (it has no legal jurisdiction).
2/ What makes you think that your personal opinion of how the GPL should be enforced is more important than that of the official FSF compliance officer. Just how arrogant can you be to think that your opinion is more important or has more weight than the official representative of the organisation that Richard Stallman (creator of the GPL and FSF) heads. If you have a problem with the FSF's ruling, then take it up with the FSF and get back to us when you get the official ruling changed (with the full text of your exchange with the FSF). If you don't agree that the FSF has jurisdiction and authority in this matter, then take it up with your lawyer and get back to us when you have a court ruling (enforceable in all the countries in which Sveasoft firmware is developed or used) that overrides the official FSF ruling (and post the full text of the court ruling).
The GPL issue has been done to death about five different times on this and on other forums. The FSF (creator of the GPL) has ruled on the issue in Sveasoft's favour. Get over it.
With respect to Sveasoft's business decision to place conditions on a subscription, and then enforce those conditions when they are broken, that is completely separate from the GPL (it's a contract law issue, not a copyright law issue). Do not mix the two together.
The GPL issue has been officially decided by the FSF (whether you like it or not). No court is going to rule against the official compliance officer ruling from the organisation that created the license in the first place. Whether you like it or not, and whether you agree with it or not, that's the fact of life that you're going to need to deal with.
The contract issue is a personal contract between an individual subscriber and Sveasoft (and perhaps PayPal as well). If you have an issue with the contract, then contact your Swedish lawyer to take it up on your behalf (Sveasoft is based in Sweden). If you have an issue with the loss of your hard-earned $20, then take it up with Paypal.
To summarise: All the talk here is just that - talk. There is no action associated with any of this talk. There are many avenues available to take action (including officially forking and creating your own SourceForge project). The only official action that anyone has ever taken (contacting the FSF's compliance officer) has resulted in a ruling in Sveasoft's favour.
It is clear that no-one here *really* cares about the GPL or contract law issues enough to take it up with any avenue of action. All you want to do is talk about it in this nice safe forum where you can't be proved wrong, where your ego can be stroked by others who agree with you, and where you can have some fun by arguing with those who do not agree with you. That's fine - everyone is free to express their opinions in any public forum. Just be honest about it. Don't try and make a legal issue out of it when the legal GPL issue has already been ruled upon.
This is 100% spot on. Why do we continue to fan this fire? rwhitby has hit the nail right on the head.
Good for you rwhitby.
--
Abit VP-6 twin 800EB's @ 1002 Mhz.Proud member of the XDC. | |
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Rhobite
Premium
join:2002-02-24
Cambridge, MA
clubs:
| Re: Before this continues get out of hand.... That's not 100% spot-on. The FSF compliance officer is an outside party with no legal power in this debate. Nothing that the FSF does is an "official action," outside of the fact that they own some (but not all) of the code in question.
If the debate generates enough attention, Linux developers will think about initiating action against Sveasoft. They're the ones whose copyrighted work may have been misappropriated. It happened with busybox vs. Linksys, why couldn't it happen with Sveasoft?
I haven't read the full discussion in the Linksys forum. Maybe my issues have been resolved. But that post you reposted does NOT answer all the questions by itself.
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Jimmysquid.com - I take pictures. | |
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Wills
join:2001-01-03
Port Charlotte, FL
| Re: Before this continues get out of hand.... Yes it does answer all the questions.
And the answer is
THERE IS NOTHING YOU CAN DO ABOUT IT, GET ON WITH YOUR LIFE.
The debate in this forum is not going to garner anyones attention that can or will do anything. The guy's whole point is stop your whinning and do something about it. Either put up or shut up.
99% of the people in that thread just need to shut up.
--
Abit VP-6 twin 800EB's @ 1002 Mhz.Proud member of the XDC. | |
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| | | waynemr
join:2002-01-28
Madison, WI
| Re: Before this continues get out of hand.... If it doesn't hurt anybody and has no bearing on anything, then why do you, and sveasoft or whatever their name is bother to comment on it at all. If it is pointless, just let folks yammer away about it. That is what an open forum is all about, right?
Seems to me that there is some importance to the public discussion, or else the official reps from the company would never have bothered to come and talk about it.
Now, if the thread personally bothers you, Willis, just don't read it. | |
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| | | | B
Premium,MVM
join:2000-10-28
| Re: Before this continues get out of hand....
The latest news is that Sveasoft is charging its own subscribers an ADDITIONAL $49 for access to the source code (on CD only) for the binaries they've received.
This is, unarguably, a clear violation of the GPL. They have stepped completely over the legal line now.
-- B
--
In a realm outside causality and function | |
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avd706
insert annoying animated gif here
Premium
join:2003-02-06
Union, NJ
| said by Wills  :
THERE IS NOTHING YOU CAN DO ABOUT IT, GET ON WITH YOUR LIFE.
...
99% of the people in that thread just need to shut up.
then what's the point of this website? we might as well close this board. | |
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CPM
join:2001-08-24
Miami, FL
| Open Source It is open Source. They Should not make money over other people's code and hard work. If they made the source code from day one totally blank then okay. But they didn't
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Broadwayman.com - Internet portal for Everything Broadway and New York. | |
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Steve
I'm a PC, so shut up
Consultant
join:2001-03-10
Yorba Linda, CA
| Re: Open Source said by CPM :
It is open Source. They Should not make money over other people's code and hard work. If they made the source code from day one totally blank then okay. But they didn't
If they have not added any value, why do so many people want to use their work? | |
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| 
Eat Me
join:2002-09-25
Sussex, NJ
 ·PenTeleData
 ·Future Nine Corpor..
·VOIPo
·Vonage
| It is legal to make money from open source.
However, the source code must be released, on demand, in exchange only for a nominal fee that covers the cost of copying.
Derivative works are also covered, meaning that if you take a piece of GPL'ed work, modify it and create a new product, you must release source code for that new product as well.
On a non-GPL issue, it is obvious that Sveasoft thinks he's God's gift to linksys users, by repeatedly threatening them to pull the firmware if they start distributing the software for free, and he implies that no one else can create firmware. | |
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Eat Me
join:2002-09-25
Sussex, NJ
·PenTeleData
·Future Nine Corpor..
·VOIPo
·Vonage
| Re: Open Source quote:
But, Open Source doesn't...
Pay for food
Pay for your house
Pay for your car
Pay for fuel
Pay for the development tools you need to build the code
Pay for the server
Pay for the bandwidth (especially if you have a DDoS, which can eat a lot)
Pay for other misc. bills
Unfortunately, while open source doesn't do any of those things, the GNU GPL is a binding license agreement.
If you want to make money from software, write it on your own, from scratch, or use code covered under a BSD license, which doesn't mandate that any derivative works also be open source. There's nothing wrong with that.
But don't take already GPL'ed code, make a derivative work, then violate the terms of the GNU GPL by refusing to distribute its source code, or bend its rules through scare tactics and ridiculous subscription fees. | |
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rchandra
Stargate S G-1 And Atlantis Fan
Premium
join:2000-11-09
14225-2105
clubs:
1 edit | ummmm....what? How about the Red Hat folks? The SuSE/Novell folks? The Mandrake folks? (oh, wait, they filed for the French equivalent of bankrupcy; maybe not.) Open source can pay for all sorts of things. It all depends. Standard labor economics apply. If you want to expend all the time it would take to build all the stuff Red Hat for example builds for you, or want to spend the efforts to obtain and use their free products, that's fine. Otherwise, a lot of people end up buying one of their CD kits or whatever because that's what they want to do. They're pretty big and they've been around for years, so obviously they're making enough money from open source to sustain themselves.
--
English is a difficult enough language to interpret correctly when its rules are followed, let alone when a writer chooses not to follow those rules.
Blog is here
Jeopardy! replies REALLY suck!
edit: s/Fench/French/ | |
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Anonymous
Premium
join:2004-06-01
IA
1 edit | ?? Can someone just examine the code and remove any 'home phoning features' and make it untraceable ?
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Stealing software since 2002
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avd706
insert annoying animated gif here
Premium
join:2003-02-06
Union, NJ
1 edit | Re: ?? a simple routing rule should do the trick. | |
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pcscdma
Chocobo Chocobo Random Battle
Premium
join:2004-01-14
Winterset, IA
clubs:
| Re: ?? said by avd706 :
n simple routing rule should do the trick.
That was a joke, right?
--
The Intel Prescott. One step closer to 50,000 watts of clear channel power! | |
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tidal
Tidal
Premium
join:2001-01-18
Madison, AL
1 edit | Re: See.. more BS here is one I got
034592bc3dfcba478f360c854d8dd7b1 | |
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| | black_ops
join:2001-12-24
Baltimore, MD | Re: See.. more BS Sveasoft's OVERreaction to these issues is really starting to annoy me.
$49.95 USD for a source code CD?????
Somebody do something please! | |
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| DerProfi
join:2004-02-10
Arlington, VA | Hmmm... It seems to me that all you did was raise a baseless bit of FUD about Sveasoft's firmware, and therefore you need to either put up or shut up. Simple, eh? | |
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chuckwil
join:2003-07-11
Deland, FL
| I've decided to do something! My plan is to not use the modded firmware that Sveasoft claims as proprietary domain. I am sure with all of the passion exhibited in this discussion that a replacment source will present itself in the not so distant future and then the Sveasoft empire will have competition. I agree that the question here should not be whether a group or an individual can claim ownership of the intellectual contribution of others for gain, we all agree that is unethical... the real issue is whether or not the firware is compromising your privacy without a disclaimer. That my friends is not an issue of ethics, that is a violation of federal law. | |
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| black_ops
join:2001-12-24
Baltimore, MD | Re: I've decided to do something! Yes, you are right. I lost focus when I visited their public announcement page. | |
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TheIndividual
| It wasn't about a GPL violation at first Hey all,
the original discussion wasn't about whether or not Sveasoft was breaking the GPL. We agreed that they can charge 20$ for making binaries available together with source code. However the flaw in this is that you can redistribute free software for free. Which means one person will get the file and distribute it to all others.
Sveasoft didn't forbit that but stated that your subscription would be canceled if you redistribute.
Still everything okay in the legal terms although it's not what the GPL is about.
HOWEVER they did not let people freely redistribute but threatened the ones redistribution (at least they threatened me) and complained to the corresponding web hosts that those copies were pirated versions. This obviously is a lie and their email correspondance with me and some forum members left a very bad taste, to say the least.
As a reaction on the discussion on BBS forums, after more and more people realized that I wasn't lying and that Sveasoft doesn't have such a clean slate as they make it appear, Sveasoft announced in their forum that they would send out source code on CD per snail mail on request, for a charge of 50$.
Now THAT is a clear violation of the GPL, since it is clearing above the costs of physical shipment. And since they had offered it for download all along I guess they only made that move to keep the firmware from the public, since all you can now get without delay is a tagged version of the binary.
To sum it up: they use all methods they can to prevent the GPL software from being spread. An issue that was a major idea in the creation of the GPL.
I hope that cleared things up, if you're interested in the issue you might want to read the entire thread. It's long but very interesting IMHO. | |
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| B
Premium,MVM
join:2000-10-28
| Re: It wasn't about a GPL violation at firstCringely at PBS seems to think that $50 is reasonable distribution costs and there's no GPL violation, because of that whole Swedish island thing, doncha know. Sucker. Shipping is $20 from what Google tells me -- that's some expensive gold-leaf CD he's shipping.
»www.pbs.org/cringely/rss/redir/c···722.html
I didn't think Cringely (not his real name) was an idiot, but perhaps I was mistaken. He's completely bought the "hey, there's no GPL violation because that compliance officer hasn't yet started doing his job" line... What a rube.
-- B
--
In a realm outside causality and function | |
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ThisSmells
@168.143.x.x | What a croc! Sveasoft has given away firmware ever since they started. Unstable stuff is the only thing restricted. So now you gonna fry some poor guys router and blame Sveasoft? You sick man. | |
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LikeMeanSpirit
| Re: What a croc! Exactly. The hilarious thing is, I'd bet dollars to donuts that these whiners never contributed ANYTHING to the 3rd party Linksys firmware scene (and I doubt they're even capable of contributing if they wanted to). They just like to show up in various forums and whine, whine, whine... | |
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jumperz
join:2004-01-14
Baltimore, MD | MD5SUM HASH b8fe9cd1719a56b88e56b4419a043d01
hope this helps guys... | |
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Anon0001
@149.142.x.x
| Re: looks like this has hit slashdot.... [taken from slash dot]
Re:Money for nothing and the sex is free. (Score:4, Interesting)
by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 22, @06:24AM (#9768229)
Ok let me try to explain it to you.
It is not about GPL violations. It is about the way Sveasoft reacts to the legal act of redistribution.
After I posted a binary of Alchemy 5.1 they send me threat emails, lied to my mail provider to get the account banned, lied to my webhost ("pirated versions") and got that account banned.
I am sick of Sveasoft's fanboys pretending that everyone else is a cheap bastard just because we stand up for our rights. It's fine with me if Sveasoft charges 1.000$ for a firmware binary as long as they let people pass it on freely.
If you're still not convinced read the emails that James send me.
A nice quote:
"You really should do some background research on who you are fucking with. I will eventually find out exactly who you are and where you live and
then we're gonna have some real fun."
»wrt54g.streamfire.net/ [streamfire.net]
[end post]
Wow threats and harassments over 20$... nice! | |
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Sveasoft Open Source Debate
Please post your MD5 hashes so we can get to the bottom of the backdoor issue. 
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