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Warn HN: Elance clients are stealing code from GitHub

31 pointsby supsterover 10 years ago
I&#x27;ve hosted source code for a couple of my side project iOS apps on Github (that are like 90% done), and it looks like somebody is claiming them as their own on Elance and bidding for developers to complete them.<p>My code:<p>https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;sapanbhuta&#x2F;Cents<p>https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;sapanbhuta&#x2F;Clean<p>Contracts on Elance:<p>https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.elance.com&#x2F;j&#x2F;ios-app-bug-fixes&#x2F;67713491&#x2F;<p>https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.elance.com&#x2F;j&#x2F;ios-app-update-needed&#x2F;67714378&#x2F;<p>I&#x27;m all for open-source and code sharing for the sake of learning, but something about this just seems disgustingly wrong.

13 comments

potatosareokover 10 years ago
This is probably not the place for me to go off on tangent, but why are you getting upset? Do you think he can finish this project on elance for $500 dollar? How is this going to affect you?<p>He is scummy guy. Ok. Agreed. But like eru said, you make your code available under MIT license. You can&#x27;t have it both way of putting your code under a license like that and then complaining when someone uses it in a way you don&#x27;t like. It seems very hypocritical to me to be angry if he is using your license properly. If I put $100 dollar out to charity and they don&#x27;t use it in a way I see fit, that is my fault, not theirs.<p>Worst case scenario he makes someone to finish the app and makes a lot of money off it. And then you have a right to be angry if he violated your license in any way. But also you should think that you are very angry because you had app 90% of way done and someone gets all credit for taking it that last 10%. But then that is your fault for not taking it that last 10% yourself.<p>I will most likely lose all my 10 hn point for this but I would just drop a note to elance and then forget about this issue. Don&#x27;t be vindictive about this. You are amazing person and have an amazing day, be more happy :) Good luck on being a doctor, forgot about this guy.
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eruover 10 years ago
In this particular instance the elancer might have violated the license. But if they were more careful about preserving attribution (and a few other cosmetics), it seems like everything would technically be above board.<p>Before you use an open source licence, especially the MIT style licences, you should ask yourself, if you are OK with a random stranger profiting off your work commercially.<p>In any case, I advice against suing, since it&#x27;s unlikely you are going to see any money. (IANAL.) I also doubt that a random elance developer will be able (or willing) to finish your work for 500 USD.
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fabulistover 10 years ago
I think you&#x27;re right to take offense, this person is blatantly claiming credit for your work. Their repository on Git doesn&#x27;t even show it was forked from yours.<p>I&#x27;d suggest you get in touch with GitHub and Elance; they&#x27;ll probably have one or both accounts suspended, and hopefully they&#x27;ll abandon the endeavor after that.
supsterover 10 years ago
NOTE: Hey guys, OP here, just to clear up the confusion the github.com&#x2F;sapanbhuta repo is mine. I included it for comparison purposes. The elance site is the other person using the code as his own. Hope that makes more sense lol
danielkiover 10 years ago
As others have said - long as proper attribution is provided in the finished product, it&#x27;s within the terms of the license that you put up. In the future:<p>* If you don&#x27;t want your code available to the public, use a private repository - either Github&#x27;s paid plans or Bitbucket (free private repos) or something similar.<p>* If you want your code publicly available, but not to be used in this way, use a different license - GPL&#x2F;LGPL, CC BY-NC-SA, etc. Research to figure out which one works best.
charlesdmover 10 years ago
You released these apps under the MIT license. This means that people can do with it what they want, as long as attribution is given in the app or when source code is used in binaries<p>If you did not want this, you should&#x27;ve released it under a different license (e.g. GPL).<p>Why are you upset?
nesuover 10 years ago
Thanks for this post. I myself have a small app that I am thinking whether to publish as GPL or other licenses (MIT or Apache). But I am worried about some shady users who would rather distribute the binaries without the source.<p>I would react the same. At least, before other users change my own code or even profit from it, they should try to contact me. But MIT license does not oblige users to disclose the source. Nothing against MIT license, but it&#x27;s somehow not a good fit for stuff that don&#x27;t require the full source in order to run.<p>Why not release a new version, and publish it as GPL? That would be clearly a violation if they accept bids on Elance like that. Or try dual licensing.
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brudgersover 10 years ago
Controlling access to Github repositories requires a paid account. The price of a free account is an open source licence.
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mapsterover 10 years ago
If he&#x2F;she is going to submit the presumed finished product to apple store, could you not intervene there?
yuashizukiover 10 years ago
He changed the license by removin ur name and placing his. This it self is a violation of the license.
yuashizukiover 10 years ago
DO u not see whats wrong here, he created a github repo changed the name on the license to make it look like he created this open source project. This is called FRAUDE. Down Vote me if u hate me for speaking the truth.
yuashizukiover 10 years ago
I am pretty sure all his other repos are fraud to.
yuashizukiover 10 years ago
I suggest you sue this fucker directly, he has violated the lincense terms and condition. <a href="https://github.com/sapanbhuta" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;sapanbhuta</a><p>press fedral charges on this asshole.
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