There are people in Amsterdam that steal bikes only to sell them for 10Eur.
I just don’t understand why would anyone do that but I am software dev working remotely it doesn’t make sense in „my world” - it most likely makes sense in someone’s else world.
If you want quick money, you sell things cheap. If you're addicted to drugs and need a quick high, you do easy crimes, and anything that's easy for money (including prostitution).
99% of game developers dont build on their own engines. It's would be like looking into Linux kernel source code to build your own music player app or TODO app. Few people who do heavy engine lifting in C++ simply not gonna bother with someone else code.
But I pretty sure everyone in modding community would be really happy.
Just a guess, but perhaps things like the process model. PID 1, fork, exec and so forth. Or argv, or environment variables, or “everything is a file”, or having just three streams (stdin, stdout, stderr).
In isolation, all beautifully simple concepts, but there has been an awful lot built on top over several decades, stretching and outgrowing the simplicity. The complexity of modern technology has to live somewhere, though.
The key difference is you are licensed and entitled to read the Linux source code.
GTA 5 hasn’t been licensed to you and you are absolutely not entitled to read it, even if you managed to get hold of it due to a theft. By reading it as an app developer you taint your knowledge with stolen intellectual property and stolen trade secrets, potentially exposing yourself and any game you work on (including for an employer) to criminal and civil penalties.
That’s the immense value of open source and Linux in specific. You are allowed to read it, improve it, rip out bits that are useful (as compliant with the license), and use the concepts as fully licensed intellectual property without trade secret encumbrance.
I am personally really interested in reading the source and see how they do things. I’m certain there’s fascinating bits of tech in there. But I wouldn’t underestimate the risk I would put myself, my family, and my employer at and the willingness of corporations to crush the small guy. See the pain inflicted by downloading mp3s, and the marginal value of copying an mp3 is infinitesimal compared to the source code of a AAA game to the studio.
If developers became tainted by knowledge of proprietary/secret code, wouldn't you be bound for life to your first employer? And wouldn't reading GPL code like Linux also taint your mind for life?
What if a coworker or some random FOSS author read the code and later used a technique they saw, and then you see it and your mind is now tainted too? Sounds like a nonsense "risk".
You actually are bound to not disclosure their trade secrets. Trade knowledge isn’t a trade secret, but there are aspects of their code they may consider “secret sauce,” which if you took and implemented at a competitor you better believe they will come after your employer for. I’ve seen it many times in my career over the last 30 years. Be careful, it’s absolutely not nonsense and you personally are potentially implicated.
Is the risk any different than that if a programmer who used to work for Rockstar games?
Aren't former employees allowed to learn from their experience working on GTA V and develop products based on that knowledge, just as Rockstar programmers have used prior knowledge to develop GTA V?
The key is trade secrets. There are aspects that are common trade skills that are transferable, but some things are considered secrets in their novelty and competitive advantage. You absolutely can not disclose those to subsequent employers.
Usually though it’s really hard to establish this unless you were a key person behind some key technology. But it’s very common in high finance (high end hedge funds, etc) that they go after people for bringing some algorithm or technique to a competitor.
But there is a huge difference between knowledge gained in employment, which is protected by employment law and common sense, and knowledge gained in the furtherance of a crime. Copying, distributing, studying, and replicating trade secrets from stolen source code is ABSOLUTELY not protected under any squinting at the law.
> By reading it as an app developer you taint your knowledge with stolen intellectual property and stolen trade secrets, potentially exposing yourself and any game you work on (including for an employer) to criminal and civil penalties.
That’s why I’m a big fan of free software (in the FSF sense). But being a fan also means I’m aware of the consequences we face in our current structure. I’m worried reading these posts most people don’t realize the grave danger they could be in.
Worse, no competitor should allow their employees to ever download or worse look at the source code as it would taint all their IP with possible theft. Just because the code is leaked doesn’t mean Rockstar has lost ownership of the intellectual property, it just means everyone distributing it is participating in the theft and everyone holding it is complicit. Worse by reading it and possibly using trade secrets embedded in the code in a competitors product exposes the competitor to civil and criminal penalties.
I would treat the source code as radioactive toxic waste to be handled at your own peril.
ReactOS also treated/treats leaked Windows source code this way (disallow contributions even if you have academic or goverment-backed permission to look at it).
Rockstar micro-transactions would be one reason for Rockstar themselves to actually care about this. Hackers summoning RMT rewards in GTAV Online were already a "problem."
This is probably the most likely source of interest; modders might get some benefit from knowing the actual source but the decompiles are usually just as good (except variable names, perhaps, see Minecraft SRG, etc).
But speedrunners might be able to realize new exploits to reduce time that aren't apparent from the decomp.
Compatibility is also a point, GTA V works pretty well on Steam Proton, but it might clarify some bugs that already exist, while also helping with better support for RDR 2 and GTA 6 in the future.
I just don’t understand why would anyone do that but I am software dev working remotely it doesn’t make sense in „my world” - it most likely makes sense in someone’s else world.