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ahepp 3 hours ago

> users are now explicitly forbidden from reverse-engineering or even attempting to understand how the platform works unless Arduino gives permission.

I briefly looked at their IDE and CLI repos and GitHub claims they're AGPL and GPL 3 respectively. I didn't see a CLA when I looked at their contribution guide.

Am I missing something here? What basis do they have to restrict users' rights to reverse engineer the software?

SimianSci 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Adafruit is wrong here

A missing piece of the puzzle that i feel is ommitted in Adafruits posting, is that the changes only affect the Arduino Cloud Services, which provide various github-like services for the arduino ecosystem. Looking over the changes with this in mind, it seems a lawyer just applied the same standard SaaS legal language to what is effectively a SaaS offering, pretty normal in most cases.

None of these changes will affect the Arduino open-source hardware project.

[EDIT] - confirmed: https://www.arduino.cc/en/privacy-policy/ all the legal language applies to the website, online services, forums, etc.

teraflop an hour ago | parent | next [-]

More precisely, from the TOS:

> The Site is part of the platform developed and managed by Arduino, which allows users to take part in the discussions on the Arduino forum, the Arduino blog, the Arduino User Group, the Arduino Discord channel, and the Arduino Project Hub, and to access the Arduino main website, subsites, Arduino Cloud, Arduino Courses, Arduino Certifications, Arduino Docs, the Arduino EDU kit sites to release works within the Contributor License Agreement program, and to further develop the Arduino open source ecosystem (collectively, the “Platform”).

> 8.2 User shall not: translate, decompile or reverse-engineer the Platform, or engage in any other activity designed to identify the algorithms and logic of the Platform’s operation, unless expressly allowed by Arduino or by applicable license agreements

So yeah, it seems like the definition of "Platform" is limited only to their hosted services.

londons_explore an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

And I can't imagine Qualcomms lawyers put much thought into this specific clause.

As soon as it becomes a PR nightmare, they might just take that clause out.

an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]
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yapyap 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Yeah I already found it odd that it was about what “users uploaded” seeing that Arduino is not necessarily a platform to upload things to, it can be, but not necessarily.

Also Adafruit being a store, isnt there a matter of conflict of interest with posts like this?

umanwizard 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

If true that's an absolutely gigantic omission, bordering on outright lying.

adfm 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Arduino is as influential as it is controversial and has been from the beginning.

https://arduinohistory.github.io

https://hackaday.com/2016/03/04/wiring-was-arduino-before-ar...

nobodyandproud 28 minutes ago | parent | next [-]

Thanks. I have no qualms about seeing Arduino getting “ripped off” then.

scuff3d an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

Jesus, they just ripped it off whole sale and claimed it was their own.

reactordev 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

This is Legal Team not doing their due diligence. Just throwing a blanket terms of service update across all “properties”.

jsheard 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

The new Arduino UNO Q features a beefy Qualcomm SOC running Linux, alongside an STM32 microcontroller which is programmable from the Arduino IDE. The MCU side is wide open, but the SOC side is full of proprietary firmware blobs, so I assume the lawyers are concerned about those being reverse engineered.

2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]
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silvanocerza 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Arduino repos require a CLA since years, it was introduced 5 or 6 years ago if I remember correctly.

1718627440 2 hours ago | parent [-]

Isn't this quite useless, when they don't have the copyright on the initial version, since they didn't require a CLA back then?

richardwhiuk an hour ago | parent [-]

CLA allows them to relicense your contributions under their own license - e.g. proprietary

A DCO would be the more friendly option.

ahepp 28 minutes ago | parent [-]

I think the question is, what use is adding a CLA if the core was under (A)GPL? Unless you go back and get all the OG contributors to sign over their rights, how can you relicense?