54 replies to this topic

[Emily]

This is not 'deadnaming', it is declaring legal names on a legal document and showing aliases to disambiguate the subject, as is generally required.
 
...
 
Again, these are legal names, and when issuing a legal document, you are required to use them if you wish it to have any legal weight or merit. If you issue a legal document only to a pseudonym or an alias, it has the legal weight of toilet tissue

I mean, my legal name is "Emily", and has been for well over a year now. You have no reason to use anything else for me other than being a dick, which is the point here. You're being a dick just to fuck with us. That doesn't make you look very good lol.
 
As for the events that have occurred here:
 
We, the people who have been maintaining and developing this project, made an administrative move, like many we have made before, when we decided to move the repo. AGN has never cared about anything we've done in the past, so why would they care now about this? This action was requested by NightmareJames on behalf of AGN- though since it has become obvious that he completely misunderstood what he was asking and how we intended on fulfilling his request (despite talking to him for HOURS and going into explicit detail- we did our due diligence on this part, James is the one who made an error). Additionally he apparently had no authority to authorize such- something which we never would have had any clue about, as James has been basically our ONLY line of communication with AGN, so getting a request from him, we had no reason to suspect it was not proper.
 
At this point, when we haven't done anything wrong or made any malicious move, we were completely removed from the organization, and changes were made on `zeldaclassic.com` specifically targeting us (re: removing the Patreon announcement, along with I believe a couple other of the recent announcements). Additionally, we then hear that in the AGN discord, we are being shit-talked about. At this point we have not received a SINGLE message from anyone at AGN, not asking for anything to be returned, not asking why we did anything, nothing. No explanation was given, only purely hostile actions. So, at this point, we have absolutely no reason to "play nice" or be courteous. (Had we received a message questioning us and explaining that there was a misunderstanding on James' part, we likely would have immediately reverted everything without question- but instead, AGN started with extreme hostility, and didn't bother to ask us about anything whatsoever?)
 
Also, the legal threats?

legal document
I am executing this LICENSE TERMINATION per the provisions of GPLv3 §8¶1, which states:
You may not propagate or modify a covered work except as expressly provided under this License. Any attempt
otherwise to propagate or modify it is void, and will automatically terminate your rights under this License
(including any patent licenses granted under the third paragraph of section 11).

In what way have we propagated or modified the covered work in a way that was not provided under the license? You seem to be using legal mumbo jumbo here that doesn't actually help your case...
 
As far as I am aware, we have not broken any laws, nor have we violated any terms of any licenses. We, owners on a GitHub repo and the only people actively contributing to said repo, moved said repo. The ONLY course of action you have here is to file a complaint with GitHub, which we already told you to feel free to do- though frankly, given the "we, owners and the only people actively contributing" part, I would expect GitHub to simply dismiss such a complaint.
 
AGN has just about burned the last of their good will with the community, I'd say.

[Ghost]

Hey Jarrod,

I'd like to first quickly cover the reasoning for moving to a new GitHub org. In hindsight I know it's come across as vindictive or sneaky, but I hope I can at least convince you it wasn't meant to be, and its only goal was to further realize a new future for ZC.

For the last year or so, we've been slowly removing "Zelda" and associated Nintendo IP from ZC, including renaming the project from Zelda Classic to ZQuest Classic. In preparation for an upcoming major 3.0 release, we recently accelerated that rebranding by preparing a new website, renaming the repository, commissioning some new media and logos, etc.

As part of this rebranding effort, it made sense that we should also address the "Armageddon Games" label attached to the project. As far as any of us knew, Armageddon Games through years of inaction had abandoned the project. Additionally James, who we understood to be in contact with you or whatever remained of Armageddon Games, requested we move the repo to a new organization (though it's now unclear he knew what that entailed).

With all that in mind, I transferred the repo to a new GitHub org. I didn't expect anyone to care, or even notice, as my summary impression of Armageddon Games has been "they don't actually exist anymore; ZC is an old project, it makes sense everyone would have moved on".

The work done by the early developers of ZC is a fantastic gift to Zelda fans. Perhaps the most important aspect of that gift was the decision to license it as GPL, ensuring a future for the project as long as someone was willing to pull up their sleeves and do the work. We are those people - as both our custodianship of the last couple years and our big plans for the future show. Core to the spirit of open source software is to be willing to pass on the baton to people willing and able to advance the project, when you no longer desire to. It saddens me that this is not the perspective anyone associated with Armageddon Games shares for a cool project they once dedicated themselves to, but no longer work on.

> We would like to assure you that Armageddon Games is committed to working collaboratively and respecting the rights and contributions of all members. We value the work you have put into this repository and believe that it can continue to thrive within our organization.

For the last 2 years all aspects of managing ZC (including feature work, bug fixes, planning, release management, community outreach, various bills, etc), has been handled by myself, Emily, and a couple other devs, all of us completely unaffiliated with Armageddon Games. Further, the last time a member from your community Armageddon Games was involved with the project -- Zoria -- it resulted in a terribly toxic environment and stunted the project, which was only resolved when he was forced to leave the development team. Since then, all users of ZC have come to know us as the custodians of the project. I invite you to take a look at the changelogs of our recent releases since Zoria left the project, I think you'll find that ZC feature development has accelerated since the removal of Zoria.

To be frank, it's very perplexing to me what you see as the current role of Armageddon Games with respect to the ZC project, and I don't see how returning the repository to the Armageddon Games GitHub org would bring any value to the project or its users. The members that do pay some attention to ZC are unreliable. James - thinking he was speaking on your behalf. Zoria - who has multiple serious instances of harassment towards others in the community, and displays little understanding for how to interact with people or understand code, as shown in this blatant misunderstanding [1] he used to rile up members of your community (he claimed we removed compression and passwords from ZC, both of which are obviously false). Even a very small token gesture of requesting donations from the community via a Patreon link on the website you manage (zeldaclassic.com), you deemed to be inappropriate and thus took down.

In reality - you have a community Discord, but no apparent common goal or software project being advanced by your members.

If you wish to contest this transfer, I suggest you open a dispute with GitHub. We will respect whatever decision they make. It's our belief that the project will be somewhat harmed if the repo is sent back; and that attempts to hold onto ZC without any serious plans to develop it further will only serve to confuse users and make it harder for them to find where the project is actually being heartily developed.

[1] https://github.com/Z...718b53#comments

P.S. Could you clarify the status of Armageddon Games as an official entity? I see that just a few months ago, the LLC as registered with Ohio was dissolved. 

This is an incredibly flippant response. Bolding mine, as you basically replied "I assumed you gave up your rights to own this project, it's mine now" and when the person said "No I didn't" you're crossing your arms and saying "well we'll vox populi the question". It's... just incredibly asinine. You put time into the project, very cool, but so did others. It sounds like from this minimal effort was made to check with them on the move, and when they raised concerns about it, you said in no uncertain terms that in your opinion they forfeited their ownership. Takes the situation from miscommunication and honest mistake straight into this for the better, go away. No wonder they're taking the action they're trying to.

 

Working on something for two years doesn't make you the official owner of it, even if it is open source software. That's what forks are for! A baton pass should probably happen, but this is probably the worst possible way to try to force it to happen. It's like whacking a kid at adoption services and still expecting them to let you adopt them.

 

The legalize seems... weird. The dead naming stupid as hell, as if Emily is going to try to sneak onto the project using it. Take away from this that it's a bad thing to do and both weakens and distracts from your case. Ya'll should apologize for that at the very least.

 

Anyhoo that's my two cents.

 

 

 

As far as I am aware, we have not broken any laws, nor have we violated any terms of any licenses. We, owners on a GitHub repo and the only people actively contributing to said repo, moved said repo. The ONLY course of action you have here is to file a complaint with GitHub, which we already told you to feel free to do- though frankly, given the "we, owners and the only people actively contributing" part, I would expect GitHub to simply dismiss such a complaint.

 

Like, it's hard to read this generously that even if it didn't start as such, this is an intentional effort to take sole control of the ZC codebase and remove older dev's admin privileges from the project against their will.

Edited by Ghost, 27 September 2023 - 10:22 AM.

[Nightmare]

Ghost's response is very valid

I am staying quiet for the interim unless outright attacked or answering direct questions, but I am hoping there will and can be a peaceful solution to this, eventually. I know everyone's angry and disappointed (including me), but I still hold out some hope. I just hope some other people change their mind.

Sorry I cannot help any more. This is above my pay grade, as you would say.

-James

Edited by Nightmare, 27 September 2023 - 10:29 AM.

[Mani Kanina]

This is all incredibly funny to me.

Zelda Classic has been an open source project for quite some time now. Literally anyone can fork it any point, heck, I've forked ZC at one point, and I'm not even a developer for it, nor do I plan on developing it.

Literally the only thing that is at stake here is who gets to say that they "own" Zelda Classic. Like, people have to see how absolutely petty and nothing that is, right? And nothing is stopping AGN from keeping to insist that they are the ones that own and are responsible for ZC, regardless of how connected they are to any and all development branches of the program. Zelda Classic has no trademark, it has no brand, and frankly, wasn't that always so by design?

Like, there is so much funny shade being thrown at Emily et al. by people who don't even have the decency to call them by their proper names. But no one has disputed the notion that the initial move of the repo was something that was requested of them to be done, of which they complied; yet it's painted up as if they went all scorch earth.

[Matthew]

Speaking personally, I can’t help but find the objections coming from the AGN folks be misguided at best and disingenuous at worst. Simply put, many years have passed since any of the old devs have contributed to the program’s development. The energy and passion with which AGN defends this laughable legal threat - where has it been when it comes to contributing to ZC or the community?

I’m not interested in the technicality of GitHub ownership, because even if it’s restored to AGN, I doubt it’ll matter from a program development perspective. What I’m more interested in is the motivation behind this post. It seems to me that this issue was contrived by jilted ex-members, in order to justify dealing a blow against current developers and a community that they personally dislike.

I’m aware this may sound conspiratorial, but the lack of involvement and care for the program on behalf of the accusatory side here leads me to believe that this is not an issue being presented in good faith. None of the arguments articulated thus far have been able to convince me otherwise.

[Emily]

Speaking personally, I can’t help but find the objections coming from the AGN folks be misguided at best and disingenuous at worst. Simply put, many years have passed since any of the old devs have contributed to the program’s development. The energy and passion with which AGN defends this laughable legal threat - where has it been when it comes to contributing to ZC or the community?

I’m not interested in the technicality of GitHub ownership, because even if it’s restored to AGN, I doubt it’ll matter from a program development perspective. What I’m more interested in is the motivation behind this post. It seems to me that this issue was contrived by jilted ex-members, in order to justify dealing a blow against current developers and a community that they personally dislike.

I’m aware this may sound conspiratorial, but the lack of involvement and care for the program on behalf of the accusatory side here leads me to believe that this is not an issue being presented in good faith. None of the arguments articulated thus far have been able to convince me otherwise.

From the discussions that occurred in the AGN discord, I would agree that the purpose of this thread is mostly to just try to smear us and get the community to hate us. I have not heard anyone on AGN's side argue in good faith once in this discussion, their entire argument seems targetted specifically at *wanting* to hate us (see again the "removing us from the repo and taking hostile actions against us, and shit talking about us openly, without having so much as sent a single message asking what happened", which is clearly a sane reaction...)

[Yuuki]

Let's ignore the fact that the .pdf file linked isn't even a legal document yet.

What makes you think it isn't and when will it become one?

[Sheik]

What makes you think it isn't and when will it become one?

I think putting more words in full caps would help.

[Aevin]

While I don't agree with all of their decisions and proposals, and don't have a ton of investment in ZC as a program at this point, it's always been incredibly apparent to me that Connor and Emily have the best interests of the program and community at heart. They're passionate about making it the best it can be, and while some people may disagree on the details of how to accomplish it, they want to grow the program and its userbase and take ZC into the future. For those who also truly want the program to succeed, I think there's productive talks to be had with the developers - by which I mean the real developers, that is, the ones developing, as opposed to the old fossils acting in bad faith who would like nothing more than to see the project and this entire site and community crash and burn. I'm in full agreement with Matthew on this point.

What makes you think it isn't and when will it become one?

I mean, in the US, anyone can sue for anything if they want to waste their time and money. But it's just not how this type of license works. Imagine if someone could just withdraw an open source license whenever they felt they weren't getting the recognition they deserved. In some cases there's thousands of branch softwares dependent on that code. Guess that means all those branches have to shut down? It's just laughable. They're blowing a bunch of hot air in order to rile up drama.
 

[Bagu]

Well, I don't think that anyone had vile intentions...
...neither the AGN Staff, nor the current developers...

This entire problem seems to be a lack of communication.
The active Developers wanna go ahead and work fast and independent, and that's good.

But (IMO) every ZC user should respect those "fossils", cause without em there won't be anything to work on
 

Edited by Bagu, 27 September 2023 - 02:01 PM.

[Yuuki]

I mean, in the US, anyone can sue for anything if they want to waste their time and money. But it's just not how this type of license works. Imagine if someone could just withdraw an open source license whenever they felt they weren't getting the recognition they deserved. In some cases there's thousands of branch softwares dependent on that code. Guess that means all those branches have to shut down? It's just laughable. They're blowing a bunch of hot air in order to rile up drama.

What do you think the termination section of the license is for? This isn't someone trying to shut down a fork.

Edited by jeffythedragonslayer, 27 September 2023 - 02:21 PM.

[Aevin]

It's for people who attempt to sell the software downstream. That's a violation of copyright because they're selling the original source code. (To be clear, while I'm not on board with the monetization model as they proposed it, that is not what it was going to do.)

 

Edit: This bit is actually wrong. The license does allow for commercial use.

[Yuuki]

It's for people who attempt to sell the software downstream. That's a violation of copyright because they're selling the original source code.

Please take a look at: https://www.gnu.org/...heGPLAllowMoney

[Aevin]

I guess I misunderstood that part. I was referencing a case in Germany where someone was successfully sued for selling something based on the license, but I must have missed some details there.

 

Can't help but feel we're missing the forest for the trees, here. It certainly doesn't seem like they've violated the license. It's a github dispute. One that really ought to have been settled in private.

[Deedee]

I would like to clarify that we have no intention of monetizing the program beyond asking for donations (see: patreon). The original proposition for monetizing ZC was an idea to allow people to sell their own quests as a way to encourage more users of the programs ("if I can make money off this, it'll be worthwhile"), also floating the idea of either allowing monetization but in exchange we get a cut, or having stuff to offer via patreon to incentivise donating so as to continue to support developers of the program (Emily for example is poor and all the patreon money has been going to her to help keep food on her family's table). This was supposed to be a premature discussion between developers that would have tackled questions about "would the community even like this?", "can we even do this under the license", etc. Of course, the discussion was made public prematurely, and the community made their stance known, and we have no intention of disrespecting their stance.

At no point have we made any action towards monetization beyond private dev chats as a "hey is this something we should look into?", and it seems to me that there's an implication that we "stole" the repo to monetize it; this is false. Emily and Connor initiated the repository move at the request of NightmareJames who was acting on behalf of AGN as a response to the discussion being made public. Our mistake was assuming he had the authority to authorize this and believing his claim that he was owner in absence of AGN folk after our last attempt to contact Warlord got radio silence. Had AGN not gone nuclear immediately, this issue would have been resolved much more cleanly.