Did PieFed 'steal code' from Pylova? Let's look at what happened
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This is my first open source project, apart from tiny bits of code that no one ever paid any attention to. Maybe I don’t know how to do open source properly, maybe I made a mistake here. Let’s find out.
The only missing part was the copyright from the original project, or some kind of attribution. But you’re always free to steal code from an open-source project if you both have the same license.
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The only missing part was the copyright from the original project, or some kind of attribution. But you’re always free to steal code from an open-source project if you both have the same license.
Yeah this is ridiculous. Neither project has copyright notices in preamble comments at the top of files, or an AUTHORS.txt, or any other kind of copyright notice. Therefore there is no copyright notice to preserve as stipulated by the AGPL. While it’s best practice to preserve Git authorship by using properly formatted patch files (like he did for the first commit), this isn’t technically required.
It’s also debatable whether the stylesheets copied here are even substantial enough works to qualify for copyright to begin with, but that’s another discussion.
The Piefed author should merge all that code right back in, but use
git format-patchfor both commits so Git authorship is preserved. If the fork fellas don’t like that, they should shutter their fork and go fork a project with a more permissive license that allows them to relicense to closed source.edit: I imagine the only reason the Pylova fork authors even cared or noticed is that the stylesheet commit showed up as a merge conflict when they were merging in upstream code – something that would not have happened if the code was merged in using a proper patch file. My guess is that there was a game of broken telephone at play here when the Piefed author heard about this from some third party.
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Yeah this is ridiculous. Neither project has copyright notices in preamble comments at the top of files, or an AUTHORS.txt, or any other kind of copyright notice. Therefore there is no copyright notice to preserve as stipulated by the AGPL. While it’s best practice to preserve Git authorship by using properly formatted patch files (like he did for the first commit), this isn’t technically required.
It’s also debatable whether the stylesheets copied here are even substantial enough works to qualify for copyright to begin with, but that’s another discussion.
The Piefed author should merge all that code right back in, but use
git format-patchfor both commits so Git authorship is preserved. If the fork fellas don’t like that, they should shutter their fork and go fork a project with a more permissive license that allows them to relicense to closed source.edit: I imagine the only reason the Pylova fork authors even cared or noticed is that the stylesheet commit showed up as a merge conflict when they were merging in upstream code – something that would not have happened if the code was merged in using a proper patch file. My guess is that there was a game of broken telephone at play here when the Piefed author heard about this from some third party.
The Piefed author should merge all that code right back in, but use git format-patch for both commits so Git authorship is preserved.
Instead of doing that, I’d just fetch their commits and merge them directly. That has the added benefit of not generating new commits with new hashes (making it easier on the fork’s side). If the original commits were signed, it would also preserve those signatures.
Neither project has copyright notices in preamble comments at the top of files, or an AUTHORS.txt, or any other kind of copyright notice. Therefore there is no copyright notice to preserve as stipulated by the AGPL.
Agreed on this part though. Although the license, under section 5, states “a) The work must carry prominent notices stating that you modified it, and giving a relevant date.” One could maybe argue this wasn’t done for the second change, but if that were to be merged in properly with git attribution intact (which also includes timestamps), that should also be fine.
I had a browse of what they’d done and saw something cool that I wanted PieFed to have too […]
This is definitely in line with the free software philosophy. It should be possible to include others’ improvements to your project, if you’ve already got their modified source code. And “stealing” code is not even a thing (it’s copyright infringement at worst, never theft).
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The Piefed author should merge all that code right back in, but use git format-patch for both commits so Git authorship is preserved.
Instead of doing that, I’d just fetch their commits and merge them directly. That has the added benefit of not generating new commits with new hashes (making it easier on the fork’s side). If the original commits were signed, it would also preserve those signatures.
Neither project has copyright notices in preamble comments at the top of files, or an AUTHORS.txt, or any other kind of copyright notice. Therefore there is no copyright notice to preserve as stipulated by the AGPL.
Agreed on this part though. Although the license, under section 5, states “a) The work must carry prominent notices stating that you modified it, and giving a relevant date.” One could maybe argue this wasn’t done for the second change, but if that were to be merged in properly with git attribution intact (which also includes timestamps), that should also be fine.
I had a browse of what they’d done and saw something cool that I wanted PieFed to have too […]
This is definitely in line with the free software philosophy. It should be possible to include others’ improvements to your project, if you’ve already got their modified source code. And “stealing” code is not even a thing (it’s copyright infringement at worst, never theft).
Although the license, under section 5, states “a) The work must carry prominent notices stating that you modified it, and giving a relevant date.” One could maybe argue this wasn’t done for the second change
In this case there was no modification as the code was copied verbatim.
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The only missing part was the copyright from the original project, or some kind of attribution. But you’re always free to steal code from an open-source project if you both have the same license.
Yeah that’s kind of the point of having open source projects after all
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Although the license, under section 5, states “a) The work must carry prominent notices stating that you modified it, and giving a relevant date.” One could maybe argue this wasn’t done for the second change
In this case there was no modification as the code was copied verbatim.
True, I didn’t consider that (though there may have been modifications made after the code was copied?). In that case, section 4 would apply, which only requires keeping notices intact, and there aren’t any as you said.
It does have this clause:
[…] provided that you conspicuously and appropriately publish on each copy an appropriate copyright notice;
A bit unsure in how that should be taken in this case. There weren’t any notices in the fork, and the copyright information is otherwise the same (the
LICENSEfile). This could also be taken to mean attribution, maybe (since most copyright notices include the author’s name), in which case git author info would’ve probably been enough too. -
This is my first open source project, apart from tiny bits of code that no one ever paid any attention to. Maybe I don’t know how to do open source properly, maybe I made a mistake here. Let’s find out.
I think the main thing here is the timing and context
The fork became into existence during the split in Piefed community around May (IYKYK). I think that the way you played out this incorporation of the code might have felt as erasure of contribution. It’s not about the code or licenses. It’s about how we treat each other. As far as I read the room, the fork became because of what was happening, not because of having a different vision. It came into existence, so those who could no longer type in Matrix support channels could still affect how the software they are running behaves. And then the mainline, they were (socially-wise) barred from influencing, copied some of their changes. And some with another author on the commit.
PyLova being a fork, you could have cherry-picked the commits. It keeps original authors. The first copy via a patch that kept attribution was better.
With the stuff going on in the background you could have asked in an issue if they are ok with you taking these parts. Legally they probably couldn’t say no, but people-wise sometimes the point is if someone asks.
You also could have mentioned them in commit message.Without that context, I think just copying the code would be ok. As far as my understanding goes, it is one of the core ideas behind open-source that improvements are not gate-kept behind the will of the one doing the improvement to share or not. Maybe a mention in the merge commit message or the first commit of the copy would be a polite thing to do.
But with the context of what was happening in the background, I think it might have felt first as “you go play away from us, you’re on your own, good luck” and then “oh, good idea. I’m gonna present it as my own”
Again, my take is about feelings and participating in communities. Not laws and licenses -
I think the main thing here is the timing and context
The fork became into existence during the split in Piefed community around May (IYKYK). I think that the way you played out this incorporation of the code might have felt as erasure of contribution. It’s not about the code or licenses. It’s about how we treat each other. As far as I read the room, the fork became because of what was happening, not because of having a different vision. It came into existence, so those who could no longer type in Matrix support channels could still affect how the software they are running behaves. And then the mainline, they were (socially-wise) barred from influencing, copied some of their changes. And some with another author on the commit.
PyLova being a fork, you could have cherry-picked the commits. It keeps original authors. The first copy via a patch that kept attribution was better.
With the stuff going on in the background you could have asked in an issue if they are ok with you taking these parts. Legally they probably couldn’t say no, but people-wise sometimes the point is if someone asks.
You also could have mentioned them in commit message.Without that context, I think just copying the code would be ok. As far as my understanding goes, it is one of the core ideas behind open-source that improvements are not gate-kept behind the will of the one doing the improvement to share or not. Maybe a mention in the merge commit message or the first commit of the copy would be a polite thing to do.
But with the context of what was happening in the background, I think it might have felt first as “you go play away from us, you’re on your own, good luck” and then “oh, good idea. I’m gonna present it as my own”
Again, my take is about feelings and participating in communities. Not laws and licensesHere’s my take about feelings and participating in communities https://join.piefed.social/2026/08/14/open-source-runs-on-good-faith/
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Here’s my take about feelings and participating in communities https://join.piefed.social/2026/08/14/open-source-runs-on-good-faith/
It’s good. It’s just that I feel there has been a room for improvement in
is there another possible interpretation, what are the motivations of the accuserin what has happened
On all 5 sides -
I think the main thing here is the timing and context
The fork became into existence during the split in Piefed community around May (IYKYK). I think that the way you played out this incorporation of the code might have felt as erasure of contribution. It’s not about the code or licenses. It’s about how we treat each other. As far as I read the room, the fork became because of what was happening, not because of having a different vision. It came into existence, so those who could no longer type in Matrix support channels could still affect how the software they are running behaves. And then the mainline, they were (socially-wise) barred from influencing, copied some of their changes. And some with another author on the commit.
PyLova being a fork, you could have cherry-picked the commits. It keeps original authors. The first copy via a patch that kept attribution was better.
With the stuff going on in the background you could have asked in an issue if they are ok with you taking these parts. Legally they probably couldn’t say no, but people-wise sometimes the point is if someone asks.
You also could have mentioned them in commit message.Without that context, I think just copying the code would be ok. As far as my understanding goes, it is one of the core ideas behind open-source that improvements are not gate-kept behind the will of the one doing the improvement to share or not. Maybe a mention in the merge commit message or the first commit of the copy would be a polite thing to do.
But with the context of what was happening in the background, I think it might have felt first as “you go play away from us, you’re on your own, good luck” and then “oh, good idea. I’m gonna present it as my own”
Again, my take is about feelings and participating in communities. Not laws and licensesWhat happened in May? Was that the vote quota?
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This is my first open source project, apart from tiny bits of code that no one ever paid any attention to. Maybe I don’t know how to do open source properly, maybe I made a mistake here. Let’s find out.
Genuinely out of the loop as a newish user, does everyone seem to hate Piefed or something?
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I think the main thing here is the timing and context
The fork became into existence during the split in Piefed community around May (IYKYK). I think that the way you played out this incorporation of the code might have felt as erasure of contribution. It’s not about the code or licenses. It’s about how we treat each other. As far as I read the room, the fork became because of what was happening, not because of having a different vision. It came into existence, so those who could no longer type in Matrix support channels could still affect how the software they are running behaves. And then the mainline, they were (socially-wise) barred from influencing, copied some of their changes. And some with another author on the commit.
PyLova being a fork, you could have cherry-picked the commits. It keeps original authors. The first copy via a patch that kept attribution was better.
With the stuff going on in the background you could have asked in an issue if they are ok with you taking these parts. Legally they probably couldn’t say no, but people-wise sometimes the point is if someone asks.
You also could have mentioned them in commit message.Without that context, I think just copying the code would be ok. As far as my understanding goes, it is one of the core ideas behind open-source that improvements are not gate-kept behind the will of the one doing the improvement to share or not. Maybe a mention in the merge commit message or the first commit of the copy would be a polite thing to do.
But with the context of what was happening in the background, I think it might have felt first as “you go play away from us, you’re on your own, good luck” and then “oh, good idea. I’m gonna present it as my own”
Again, my take is about feelings and participating in communities. Not laws and licensesI feel you’ve hit this on the head directly.
We’ve attempted polite communications through normal channels, and were accused of toxicity. We aren’t blocking Rimu or any of the main contributors from contacting us. I don’t care about the code.
At this point, several of us are being judged 100% on association… since we have been seen being friendly with those that Rimu has deemed Toxic, we are immediately excluded and have slander lobbied at us from over a .social wall (and the piefed blog especially). We are not given chance to correct errors. We are not given a direct way to make our replies (affected servers are unable to show replies to .social threads within those walls).
This is by Rimu’s design, and has caught many innocent people under the umbrella he calls toxic.
I care not how he wants to run his server, but using it to outright slander others is immature at best, and directly harmful to the fantasy Perfect Fedi he claims to adhere to.
Mia left the soft fork in place on Codeberg, and I delayed aspects of moving A.N over to PyLova. I wanted to have a chance to mend communications initially. PR between the projects is still not only possible but I expect to happen, for the betterment of Fedi overall. There is an accepted way. GIT and Codeberg have ways that are the typical for forks and moving code in a sane and appropriate way. Intentionally going outside of these paths either paints Rimu as incompetent with the basic tooling required, or outright disingenuous about motive.
There’s an old saying about absolute power… perhaps his walled garden has made him feel too powerful for his own good.
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This is my first open source project, apart from tiny bits of code that no one ever paid any attention to. Maybe I don’t know how to do open source properly, maybe I made a mistake here. Let’s find out.
Is there a point having this up for discussion on an instance where one party has largely been blocked / shadowbanned? Take it to one of the neutral comms if the intention is good.
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Is there a point having this up for discussion on an instance where one party has largely been blocked / shadowbanned? Take it to one of the neutral comms if the intention is good.
Well, both side were wrong. However, we were accusated of :
- being nazi, bullshit !
- being zionist, bullshit !
- being transphobe, bullshit !
- being centrist, bullshit !
- being anti-anarchist, bullshit !
- using social credit, bullshit !
- shadowbanning, bullshit !
You may want start this story with dbzer0 supporting “murder all zionists” and check that mod that banned lot people for zionism…
Some people that still accuse us about this and that…they completly missed my point with my message on yptb.
Yes, i deleted some post, some comment were deleted by our staff. You are on piefed.social, so there is some bias…so, yes it is more neutral here.
But i consider this serie of posts are the first step for moving on and let Rimu share his own point of view.
