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"MAMEdev are *aggressively* trying to move to a commercial license" What???

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JoeB:
I was wondering, from the typical mame user point of view, what (if any) change will we see from moving from the current custom bsd like license to a pure bsd or gpl one? All of us use bsd/gpl devices everyday. From the Linux kernel that powers our TVs, smart phones, routers, to complete oses like Linux and osx.  I totally understand the impact on developers (code you wrote can now be used by companies to make $$$ without a penny going back to you) but how different is that from the thousands of gpl/bsd apps that are out there now?

Do most mame devs (past and present) really care that much? I was under the impression that most open source devs do it not because they want to get rich/famous but just because they do it for fun / have an "itch to scratch".

David, I respect your work A LOT and understand how ---smurfy--- it might be for you. But do most mame devs really feel the same way?

JoeB:
One last thought, if mame decides to go gpl instead of bsd than all commercial versions must supply the changes freely back. This is how we get good 3rd party firmware hacks to routers for example. Commercial companies can throw a ton of $$$ into mame development to make it better (think Firefox and chrome for example) can't this be good for end users in the long run?

Haze:

--- Quote from: JoeB on October 15, 2013, 11:32:27 pm ---One last thought, if mame decides to go gpl instead of bsd than all commercial versions must supply the changes freely back. This is how we get good 3rd party firmware hacks to routers for example. Commercial companies can throw a ton of $$$ into mame development to make it better (think Firefox and chrome for example) can't this be good for end users in the long run?

--- End quote ---

It works for routers, but emulators are a bit different.

Outside of hobby use there isn't really a great market for doing emulation PROPERLY.  Emulation in commercial projects is typically about producing a shippable project at any cost and reshaping parts of the games to be more suitable for modern audiences / the current legal climate etc.  I've seen the results of such projects in the past and most if it is about to what degree they can dismantle the emulator and take shortcuts (eg not emulate any of the sound hardware but replace it with streamed audio and samples, hack in an achievements system) etc.  it's closer to creating modernized 'bootlegs*' of the games than actual emulation.

The code that would get contributed back is unlikely to be of great worth, people already use MAME findings as a reference (which we permit), companies don't supply original materials and documents, the people doing the emulation work commercially are typically not great reverse engineers (why do you think there are no actual Raiden 2 arcade emulators as part of recent the commercial packs?)

As I've mentioned, if the intention really is just to allow museums to use it then this sledgehammer approach was NOT called for.  Personally I don't mind if a museum uses it because it's very much in the spirit of the project, for the good of the world etc.  I do mind if every scumbag company around the globe sees MAME as a new perfectly legal thing they can use to mislead people into thinking is some fantastic new technology and sell without adding anything of worth.

It's really just 3 devs pushing hard for the change, but as they're key devs it's hard to resist.  I feel we should have been given more realistic options, and can't help but think there ARE deeper motives.

*most will even re-order the rom data to make decoding easier, pre-decrypt any code and store the decrypted copy on disc instead rather than emulate the encryption hardware, bypass long startup screens etc. it's actually a very similar process!

ed12:
JoeB
lets try this the other way around
if u had agreed to a general lic.. with a ton of trems which u read and thought
ok ican abide by that...then u hand over a boat load of patchs and d/l's for free
to find out ppl are now going to have to pay for it..?
how would u feel about.? in truth ?
in general i would hand u code /.img/.bin/.dat/.exe./bat/.bash/.trz
but the truth i did that work,and not u
this is the up-roar

ed

JoeB:
I think calling GPL or BSD a "commercial" license to be unfair to end users.

Yes, it's more "commercial" friendly, but it's not the same as closed source.  Are the 3 DEV's trying to close the source? are they trying to make it so that future users much purchase MAME to use it?

David, I understand your argument, but isn't that a "worst case" scenario? Isn't it true that most users here will use the standard MAME version rather than the hacked crappy version?

How different is this from what's happing now with devices like 60-in-1?

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