{"id":299882,"date":"2021-07-15T18:41:25","date_gmt":"2021-07-15T15:41:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/audacity-mess-further-muddied-by-muse-groups-new-licensing-efforts-review-geek\/"},"modified":"2021-07-15T18:41:25","modified_gmt":"2021-07-15T15:41:25","slug":"audacity-mess-further-muddied-by-muse-groups-new-licensing-efforts-review-geek","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/audacity-mess-further-muddied-by-muse-groups-new-licensing-efforts-review-geek\/","title":{"rendered":"#Audacity Mess Further Muddied by Muse Group\u2019s New Licensing Efforts \u2013 Review Geek"},"content":{"rendered":"

“#Audacity Mess Further Muddied by Muse Group\u2019s New Licensing Efforts \u2013 Review Geek”<\/strong><\/p>\n

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\"Audacity
Audacity<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Earlier in July, a privacy policy update for audio editor Audacity caused a stir among community members, who cited unnecessary telemetry. Parent company Muse Group offered assurances to the contrary but has now seemingly put telemetry\u00a0back on the table<\/a> along with some concerning licensing issues.<\/p>\n

Audacity\u2019s community is concerned by the policy, as the open-source software has never required an Internet connection since it was first released. Muse Group<\/a>\u2018s sudden addition of details regarding data collection (and data sharing) to its privacy policy was understandably concerning.<\/p>\n

The policy update stated<\/a> that Muse Group would be collecting a variety of data; most of which is commonplace\u2014like crash reports, non-fatal error codes, user computer information, and geographical location\u2014but some raised eyebrows, like \u201cdata necessary for law enforcement and authorities\u2019 requests (if any).\u201d It also added that the software is \u201cnot intended for individuals below the age of 13\u201d and requested that people under that age \u201cplease do not use the App<\/a>.\u201d While that age may seem arbitrary, it\u2019s not; 13 is the age under which a company will have to deal with various international child data collection laws and limitations.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Audacity<\/a><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Russia-based company also dropped a shocking new Contributor License Agreement<\/a>\u00a0(CLA) on Audacity\u2019s GitHub page. In it, Muse Group\u2019s Head of Strategy, Daniel Ray, explained that all future and past contributors are bound by the agreement; this gives the company full rights and control over contributed code (including how it is or can be used). The agreement states that \u201ccontributors retain copyright to their code and are free to use it however they like,\u201d but also that they won\u2019t have a say in any code already merged into Audacity.<\/p>\n

Why implement the CLA, you ask? Muse Group intends to relicense the software, moving it from GPLv2 to GPLv3<\/a>, which would open it up to a wider variety of technologies and libraries that the company is interested in. For the record, it owns several popular music-centric applications, like Ultimate Guitar, MuseScore, StaffPad, Tonebridge, and MuseClass.<\/p>\n

The CLA and relicensing efforts are all fine and dandy (and certainly not unheard of in the open-source community) and either would probably go over more or less just fine with users, but the problem lies with the fact that Ray said the company might decide to dual-license the code. This could potentially allow Muse Group to put out a separate version of Audacity under a different license. Ray cited vendor redistribution requirements (say, for Apple\u2019s App Store) as the reason why this clause is necessary, but the statement is quite vague and could have other implications.<\/p>\n

The new CLA also states that Muse Group can use contributor code in other closed-source products \u201cto support the continued development of Audacity.\u201d While the company already does this with its own code, \u201cthe CLA allows us to do it with our contributors\u2019 code, too. This is necessary because community code and internal code often get mixed in ways that are difficult to separate later on \u2026 We cannot allow the fact that we accept contributions from the community to become a disadvantage that prevents us from using our code in other products.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"More
Audacity<\/a><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Given Audacity\u2019s open-source nature, it\u2019s easy to see why the CLA has caused such a ripple within the community. Tons of people have contributed to the software\u2019s code over the years, and it would likely be a massive undertaking to get them all to sign off on these changes. However, in reply to a comment voicing such concerns on the CLA blog post, Ray emphasized<\/a> that Muse Group would only need major contributors to sign off. Trivial commits (single submissions with only a few lines of code) would simply be rewritten so the company wouldn\u2019t have to track down all original authors and get them to sign off as well.<\/p>\n

Ray stated<\/a> that the original privacy policy that was released was a mistaken draft and all of the confusion and spyware accusations were \u201cdue largely to unclear phrasing in the Privacy Policy, which we are now in the process of rectifying.\u201d He also added some further clarification about it, saying that Audacity version 3.0.3 will only collect data like the user\u2019s IP address, basic information regarding the user\u2019s computer, and optional error reports. He also took measures to assure users no data will be collected for law enforcement purposes and that users can run the program offline to skirt the policy outright.<\/p>\n

This is all a lot to process, and it\u2019s no wonder many long-time Audacity contributors and users feel slighted and\/or concerned for the software\u2019s future. Muse Group\u2019s retraction of its original privacy policy after the backlash\u2014and its subsequent backpedaling and labeling it as a mistaken draft\u2014still reads suspicious and will be hard to overlook.<\/p>\n

Not surprisingly, some users have already forked the software into a new project<\/a>, dubbed (appropriately) Tenacity. While there\u2019s no guarantee that the project will survive or be favored over Muse\u2019s version (or any other alternative programs), the fate of that version of the software is still up in the air. Here\u2019s hoping it lands on its feet in one way or another.<\/p>\n

via Hackaday<\/a><\/small>\n<\/div>\n