So the author of Listen has taken code from Quod Libet (including code from my lyrics plugin) and ripped the copyright section (and my name) out and used it in his software. Now the code is GPL so I’m completely fine with him using it, it’s why I write open-source code, but removing my name from it is not cool. Unlike Joe I’m not mad at him, I’m sure he was just confused on how this all works. I’m really glad the Listen author didn’t make a big scene over the thing and started fixing it. I know Joe’s language in his open letter was pretty harsh, but that’s the way he is–Especially when he’s mad. He’s called me a moron on countless occasions because I was being a moron. In Abaakouk Mehdi’s case, Joe called his program ugly, and to be frank it is. One of my friends (Julie) looked at a screenshot of Listen and said “That music player looks way too busy and complicated for me.” and she’s by no means a computer illiterate. I don’t mean that comment to be stop-energy I mean it as a constructive comment. From the screenshots Listen looks like it can be a very cool program. The iPod support is definitly something I’d like to check out.
I think the reason Joe brought this up in an open letter was to shed some light on the whole GPL version 3 issue. Joe, Linus and many others don’t like it. So it’s really important to nab this problem of GPLv2 and GPLv2 and up issue while it’s still small. The licenses are the foundation of our comunity, and have a tremendous power to change the world. It’s a bigger issue than most of the people who commented on Joe’s blog realize.
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