Mazda DMCA takedown of Open Source Home Assistant App
Mazda DMCA takedown of Open Source Home Assistant App
Misleading title, though. Not Home Assistant, but a Home Assistant Integration.
Mazda false DMCA takedown notice Home Assistant App
That's a bunch of words, yes.
Soon this all will be much easier. From 12 of September we’re going into a new world of EU Data Act that forces all companies to allow third parties to communicate with iot devices. Which a car is.
So soon Mazda will need to provide those APIs in an official way.
Based on its name, I have to assume the EU Data Act only applies in the EU. So this will still be an issue for anyone who doesn't live in the EU.
You jailbreak your 2032 Mazda CCX-900 (the smallest car they offer, a limousine) to use the EU firmware so you can utilize an open source app, suddenly the display changes to KM/H and the car demands you sing the French national anthem before it will start and all so your car doesn't dial into to Mazda corporate to let them know you're currently going to the store for beans and rice.
That sounds fantastic! Mind sharing any articles on it, please?
Thing is there’s somehow not much coverage on this topic in the media. I only got our internal corporate documents because at our place we’re preparing for it for months already. Its not that easy to invite third parties to a big piece of your cloud iot setup.
EDIT: here is longer but good source. The law came into power somewhere last year but companies had some extra time to prepare their shit which times out September 12
https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/factpages/data-act-explained
There's a new world order, let the buyer beware. Even when you can afford it, they will change it so you can't.
The only text on that page that states the origin of the dev's code is Mazda's claim that the relevant code is Mazda's. If their claim is true, then it would seem to me the DMCA takedown is valid.
The reason the DMCA takedown notice is malicious is that code from Mazda's official app is not required to develop a tool that works in a similar way. The API of the server is freely accessible and figuring out how to interact with it can be done completely without infringing on anyone's copyright.
Okay, it doesn't matter how it could have been done, it matters how it was done, and again, the only claim made on the page is that it was stolen code.
I'm all for actually owning what you buy and being able to integrate it with your other stuff however you please, but distributing someone else's work is a valid claim for infringement. And as with any other cloud-based stuff, don't expect it to work forever. Support and push for local device access without the need for cloud services.
Claiming that some open source code is really proprietary is pretty bold. I suppose they could prove that by releasing their code, but to me it smells like they've been using open source code without attributing it for a while. And now they're trying to solve this problem by taking down the original.
Honestly, an assertion that open source code is really stolen seems pretty easy to prove wrong.
As per the DMCA listed in the reference:
MNAO analyzed some of the code and determined that the code provides functionality same as what is currently in Apple App Store and Google Play App Store.
Here’s a fork that’s still up and explains how the DMCA request was made based off of functionality and not proprietary code.
I wish the devs would just ignore the corporations. Refuse to let life and joy be damaged by some cuntish entity.
Mazda is asshole
They want to ignore corporations but they can't. Sad reality