Telegram for Android is no longer open source | Hacker News Reader

Telegram for Android is no longer open source

lucb1e.com

41 pointslucb1e15 comments

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While I don't know what this article says (it doesn't load for me), I agree with the title.

The github repository isn't updated any more since Oct 11, 2016. [1]

Serious question: Is it possible to just stop publishing the source of a GPL2 licensed software?

[1] https://github.com/DrKLO/Telegram/commits/master

if you own the copyright to a peice of code, you are free to relicense it however you want, at any time.

Existing code in the wild will keep the license it was distributed with, but nothing obliges you to keep updating it.

1) GPL does make statements about the output of it (i.e. binary builds, which is distributed over the Google Play Store). The app itself does not mention it's GPL, but Telegram.org does.

2) The old code was GPL, so the new one (unless they rewrote it) is a derived work.

I'm not sure the second one applies if it's the original author who relicenses it, but I'm reasonably sure it's at least a legal grey area, and the first one would still be a thing.

It is not a legal gray area, this is the basis of a lot of products with open source versions and "pro" versions with extra features that cost money.

Alright, what about the first?

The thing is, Telegram only owns portion of the copyright. There are also a few other copyright holders as a result of their commits having been pulled in. Telegram cannot legally relicense the codebase without first getting approval from those people. I really doubt that they have done that and if I'm true the app is still GPL.

> While I don't know what this article says (it doesn't load for me)

That is strange, first time apache crashed like this in the 5 years I run this blog. Usually it throws an error at least instead of connection refused.

Anyway, kicked it back alive. Sorry about that.

Update:

This url works: http://lucb1e.com/?p=post&id=129 It would be nice if it could be replaced.

I recently tried to compile Telegram (for android) and couldn't get it to work. Just wanted to make a small change (not to add the username to the clipboard when sharing messages).

I may be an idiot, of course, but does anyone have the necessary steps? I did obtain a new api id https://core.telegram.org/api/obtaining_api_id

The apk installs, but the app doesn't start.

edit: Found this

    I'll update source code after next release. @DrKLO on 31/01/2017

https://github.com/DrKLO/Telegram/commit/64e8ec3fbd26a876b76...

There is a popular fork of the telegram android app (used e.g. by f-droid) https://github.com/slp/Telegram-FOSS

Maybe this repo compiles.

> not to add the username to the clipboard when sharing messages

That would be great, actually. Maybe we should start a fork.. but then we'd miss the latest 6 months of features unless we feel like putting in so much work they switch to us being official. Great fun.

Here: https://github.com/DrKLO/Telegram/blob/e313885ac540c31ea02c8...

Maybe they got gag ordered? That would explain the behavior of not even really acknowledging the change.

Perhaps they removed existing GPL code from the code base and thus were no longer bound to copy-left.

Their iOS repo was finally updated couple of weeks ago after last update from August, 2016.

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