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Comment by aplusbi | Hacker News Reader

And he could have politely asked Martin to take it down. Zed was being "not nice" no matter how you look at it. He could have been worse, but that's like saying you shouldn't be mad because I punched you in the stomach instead of the face.

Edit: okay, the analogy is a strawman but seriously, just because someone could have been worse doesn't excuse their behavior. Telling someone they have no class is rude, especially when it's pretty clear that Martin wasn't trying to plagiarize Zed's book - he was just confused about its licensing.

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The bit that gets me about the defenses of Emde: He "punched" Shaw.

Admittedly, this is a point that people defending the guy (and from the current state of the project's readme, himself) only acknowledge in the most grudging way, but it's there - Edme wronged the guy.

But I'm to take it that Shaw is wrong because he's not friendly in his response to that?

It's trite to make remarks about Asperger, social dysfunction among geeks, etc., but there is something remarkable about the Yeah, I did something blatantly wrong, but he was mean to me when he told me to stop doing it, and that's what's important! attitude put forth and defended.

In most parts of modern society, the honest response would be along the lines of, "Dude, you're being a dick."

No, he bumped into Shaw. Nothing points towards malice at all. In most parts of modern society, the honest response would be along the lines of, "Dude, what were you thinking?"

Let me know when bumping into someone is a federal offense.

I think the problem is that we are arguing two different things here. You are arguing that Martin committed a crime and acted like a douchebag. I agree 100% with this. I am in no way trying to defend Martin's copyright infringement. What Martin did was wrong and Zed had every right to ask him to take down the book.

What I am trying to argue is that Martin wasn't being malicious, he made an honest (albeit stupid) mistake. It sounds like he believed that Zed would be thrilled that someone was extending LPTHW to Ruby and didn't realize he was committing copyright infringement in the process. To be clear this in no way excuses him from the consequences.

I am drawing this conclusion from the following: Martin acknowledged Zed's authorship and that Martin contacted Zed to let him know about the project. I am also speculating that Martin was ignorant of the licensing and assumed a permissive license. LPTHW is distributed for free (as in beer) and Zed has released a lot of other things for free (as in freedom). It's not that much of a stretch to see how someone could assuming that this "free" book was open.

Zed had every right to ask Martin to stop writing the book. I don't feel that calling Martin "classless" was called for however, given that Martin seems to be a Zed fanboy of sorts.

For some reason you seem to think that I am arguing that Zed is 100% in the wrong. I am not. I'm just saying that both acted in a manner that is unbecoming of civilized people.

As an analogy, let's say I wrote some fan-fiction based on a story I really like. In the process I copied too much of the original source. I publish it on my blog and e-mail the author of the story a link to it, thinking that the author will excited to know that she inspired me to write and will maybe enjoy seeing a different take on her work.

Instead calls me classless for not writing my own original story and tells me to remove it from my blog.

While she has every right to ask me to remove it considered I'd copied too much of the original work, I wasn't trying to offend her - just the opposite in fact!

Was I wrong? Yes, of course. I posted her copyrighted story on my blog. Was I classless? I would argue no - my intent wasn't to write an original story, but to extend a story that I loved.

At this point, I might be tempted to call her out for calling me classless (which I really shouldn't do, and Martin did), but it's easy to see how I could feel that way. A simple "please remove this" would have been sufficient, I would have realized my error and I wouldn't feel bitter about the exchange.

TL;DR - There is a difference between being ethically wrong and legally wrong and two wrongs don't make a right.

No, your problem is that you're unwilling to acknowledge that Edme committed an intentional act that was wrong - and that Shaw didn't. Shaw's mildly harsh reaction to Edme's act does not make him "the bad guy", and it does not even make him "a bad guy" or "one of the bad guys in this situation".

I'm really disturbed by the mentality that Edme and his supporters, including you, have put forward: if you do something wrong, that should be instantly forgivable, and anyone showing any anger or disapproval towards you is at least as wrong as you are. I think it shows up in worse cases than this: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1880467

Edme has at least twigged that most other people aren't buying it. I've no idea when you will clue in, but I'm not responding to you further on this issue.

Alright, I know you said you are not responding further, but you are misinterpreting what I am saying. At no point have I been unwilling to acknowledge that Martin committed an intentional act that was wrong. I am not saying that Zed is at least as wrong, not even close. The most wrong person in the entire exchange is Martin. I've clearly failed to communicate this to you and I apologize.

I'm just trying to say that when people make mistakes they should be corrected, but correcting them politely is more effective. I think this is especially true when the person who made the mistake looks up to you.

You are free to disagree with that, but please stop putting words in my mouth.

Edit: If I'm not mistaken, you have just said that Zed's response was "mildly harsh". It looks like we agree with each other. I think Martin committed copyright infringement and that Zed's response was mildly harsh (I think I initially used the word "rude").

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