People selling MediaPortal on eBay

[tstaddon]

Out of interest, there's a guy flogging MediaPortal downloads for two quid a time on the UK site and claiming this is not a breach of the license.

That can't be right, surely?

http://search.ebay.co.uk/_W0QQsassZthefamilytayoQQhtZ-1

[Muldini]

Sadly it is, use the search function for previous eBay threads.

Regards,
Muldini

[Wapiya]

I cant believe that....but how can he sell things wich people can download....who will buy this.....? This guy should better do a donation to MP

[walkerx]

if anything MP should list the product on ebay

charge a fee for postage/packaging and state that all other users selling it are not authorised to do so.

many companies now supply downloadable software on cd/dvd for a small fee - even microsoft does this

we could tell ebay that these users are selling stuff without the developers permission, remember if the seller supplies wrong version, incorrect advice, etc, etc they buyers will complain to mp about it

but if they supplying good advice, etc, etc then this helps mp

but overall imho nobody should be selling/advertising mp unless it was mp themselves

[Vattenmelon]

Mediaportal is gpl licensed, so everyone can sell it. Wheter you like it or not. You have to supply the sourcecode though.

[Redth]

Yep, this happens with lots of GPL'd products. The only thing you can really do to stop it is to increase public awareness of the issue. Obviously no one would want to pay for it if they know it's free.

[m0deth]

I can only see this being viable if they bother to get the versions matched, download and organize all the skins and plugins available for said version, basically do all the legwork you have to do yourself. Maybe include the installation vids for the the tv server and such, related materials, source code, and put it all together on a printed dvd, with a nice pacakage using your package graphics....then that would be a one stop type of service product, where the sale isn't on the freely available software, it's on the time spent to make it a hard package. This would make it easier on those poor souls who still have dialup in rough country areas to get what they need without having to wait a week for it all to download only to find they might have grabbed the wrong version of some step somewhere.

If it's just a quick and dirty download to cd....they should be flogged for not respecting the work involved here. EDIT: After inspecting his sale....he should be flogged for only offering a zip download of materials...that's lame...

truly lame

[Broceliande]

Originally Posted by Vattenmelon

Mediaportal is gpl licensed, so everyone can sell it. Wheter you like it or not. You have to supply the sourcecode though.

Unfortunatly that's true .
Anybody's allowed to do so .
However if the source code or the location to find it isn't explicitly specified , then it breaks GPL.
Any changes in source code must be downloadable or provided as well.
Hopefully users wich would like to buy it will type before in google to see what it is and just realize then can have the latest for free.

[elliottmc]

Hi,

I have exchanged a couple of polite emails with the seller, and apparently he makes a donation to MediaPortal each month based on his sales.

He does not include the source code on his CD. He feels that pointing out that the software is covered under the GPL and providing a web address for the source is sufficient.

I suspect that in general very few (if any) of these ebay sellers include the source. The only way to be certain would be to buy a copy from them. Then, of course, you have to decide whether to take any action. I guess that would divert resources away from the coding, which has to be a bad thing.

The only ones I really get annoyed about are those who advertise MP as "Windows XP Media Portal Edition Media Centre" or something similar in order to trick the unwary into thinking they are getting Windows MCE. And they charge a price which would mean that this is a reasonable conclusion!

Cheers,

Mark