ONLYOFFICE flags license violations in “Euro-Office” project
www.onlyoffice.com
The “Euro-Office” initiative is an evident and material violation of ONLYOFFICE licensing terms and principles of international intellectual property law.

Recently, IONOS and Nextcloud announced their new, sovereign office suite called “Euro-Office” and claimed they were using components of ONLYOFFICE. It seems they are doing so without checking the licences first and without cooperating with them.

Original announcement:

Nextcloud and Ionos are promising a modern, open-source office suite for the summer. To achieve this goal, they have forked OnlyOffice.

heise.de

ONLYOFFICE reply:

Based on publicly available information, the “Euro-Office” project uses technology derived from ONLYOFFICE editors in violation of our licensing terms and of international intellectual property law.

onlyoffice.com

  • ryven@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
    2·
    9 days ago

    the obligation to retain the original product logo (Section 7(b));

    the denial of any rights to use the copyright holder’s trademarks (Section 7(e)).

    Uhhh is it just me or is it impossible to follow the first requirement without violating the second one? The logo requirement seems engineered to make sure that you can’t actually fork the project: if you include the original logo, they can hit you for trademark violation, and if you don’t include the logo they can say you violated their license terms.

    • Wispy2891@lemmy.worldEnglish
      2·
      9 days ago

      Difference between Open Source and “open” source

      This is “open” source and it was the main reason it got forked (lots of proprietary bits included as binary, impossible to send a PR, obfuscated code)

      It’s “open” exclusively for marketing “our product is better because it’s open source” and mostly because in this way they can use GPL 3 code for libraries without paying for a different license

      Fuck them

      • partial_accumen@lemmy.worldEnglish
        2·
        6 days ago

        This is “open” source and it was the main reason it got forked (lots of proprietary bits included as binary, impossible to send a PR, obfuscated code)

        Wasn’t this methodology the whole reason GPL 2 evolved to GPL 3 because Tivo was doing this exact thing? They used the underlying open source free work of others, but then wrap their own contributions in priopriatry binaries not distributed with source code. This method wasn’t in violation of the letter of GPL rules even though it was clearly a violation of the spirit of the GPL rules.

        How are they able to skirt the GPL 3 rules this time?

      • IcyToes@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
        1·
        8 days ago

        “Source available” is the accepted term. Without a legitimate well tested open source license, it isn’t free to distribute and therefore doesn’t meet the one of the 4 principles of open source.".

  • Buffalox@lemmy.worldEnglish
    1·
    9 days ago

    From the blog:

    ONLYOFFICE is distributed under the GNU Affero General Public License v3 (AGPL v3)

    And

    preserving ONLYOFFICE branding in derivative works;

    IDK seems to me it’s not really GPL if you can’t fork it, and that clause is certainly not compatible with any other GPL code.

    If they use any GPL code they are probably in violation of that license.
    Looks to me like they want to appear opensource, while keeping control of the code?

    ensure a balance between openness of the code and protection of the rights of the copyright holder.

    Yep there it is, this is completely contradictory to how GPL 3 works. You can’t call it GPL3 and at the same time claim the copyright.
    ONLYOFFICE is completely misunderstanding how AGPL works.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_Affero_General_Public_License

    The main purpose of AGPL was to facilitate the use of GPL for online services, which wasn’t really possible to make with older GPL versions, because they require distribution of the source code together with the software.

    • fonix232@fedia.io
      1·
      9 days ago

      You’re misunderstanding the point of AGPL.

      Regular GPL software CAN be run over a network, but because the binary of the software isn’t distributed - only an interface is provided to the software itself - the host isn’t obligated to provide the source code. A lot of software hosts used this loophole to get around sharing their modifications to GPL licenced software, killing the main point.

      That’s why AGPL was developed - to protect hosted software. AGPL requires the host to provide source to anyone who has access to the service, not just the binary.

      GPL - if I have the binary, I must be granted access to the source

      AGPL - if I can access the software, I must be granted access to the source

  • empireOfLove2@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
    1·
    9 days ago

    If IONOS is involved in anything I automatically assume they’re in the wrong. What a fucking scumbag of a predatory company. I made the mistake of using them for some web hosting and ended up being charged for extra contracts that you CANNOT CANCEL AND TRIPLE IN PRICE HALFWAY THROUGH THE CONTRACT.

    Fuck them I cancelled my debit card.