Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by sublimefire 36 days ago
Being a bot of a devils advocate here. What I do not understand if it just looks similar, or implements the same features, or the code is actually copied and modified, i.e. the source is obviously from papermark. I think interfaces can be copied, thinking along the lines of implementing a protocol or a feature, so that would be legit. The UI looks very similar but if this is a totally different code then what? is it copyright infringement on the look and feel of the papermark brand?

Clearly it should be an issue for the investors anyway as it “looks” like a copy in the tweet alone, it might mean this code will eventually become available from download to comply with agpl, which in turn wipes out any moat.

1 comments

The English verbiage is identical. That's a clear copyright violation even if the codebase is otherwise unique.
I do not see how it is clear and which license is affected. People mix up agpl license terms which is not clear if being violated here and copyright based on branding. agpl does not cover the looks, it is all about the copy-left nature and code availability. I use the same licensing but struggle to so how could you enforce it if the code is different (not sure if it is different here).