Microsoft employee:
Hi, This is a high priority ticket and the FFmpeg version is currently used in a highly visible product in Microsoft. We have customers experience issues with Caption during Teams Live Event. Please help
Maintainer’s comment on twitter:
After politely requesting a support contract from Microsoft for long term maintenance, they offered a one-time payment of a few thousand dollars instead.
This is unacceptable.
And further:
The lesson from the xz fiasco is that investments in maintenance and sustainability are unsexy and probably won’t get a middle manager their promotion but pay off a thousandfold over many years.
But try selling that to a bean counter
I think the maintainer just viewed the bug report as tone deaf. Microsoft is a trillion dollar company and apparently relying on this library without a support contract. Then they a open a high priority bug item. The maintainer saying it’s unacceptable is them basically saying they won’t prioritize any work unless there’s an existing support contract and that they don’t do one off payments for bug fixes, which I think is fair.
I think this mentality shows a clear dissonance between how maintainers are licensing their software and what are their expectations in terms of retribution from users of their software.
If they release a software package with a license that explicitly states that they allow the whole world to use it freely without any expectation if return, they cannot complain afterwards that some particular people in the world end up using it.
Likewise for bug reports.
If they want to get paid because the software they have been releasing to be used freely by everyone is being used freely by a specific company then they need to get their shit together and release it under a license where they explicitly state their terms. This is crítical for everyone involved, specially end users, because we need clarity on these terms.
I’m not really sure what you’re saying here. Microsoft have every right to fix the bug themselves and the maintainer has every right not to. Open source software doesn’t come with a warranty in most licensed.
Yes, it does. You do too, and so do I.
Does it make sense to you for me to attack you for this?
And how about any person submitting a bug report? Is it ok to pile up on them for not fixing it themselves?
If you change the names, is your attitude any different? If it is, then you have a problem on your hands, and it’s a personal problem.
It’s not that they made a big report. It’s that they, a multi-billion dollar company, had the nerve to mark it as “High Priority” and request that a volunteer fix it for them so their proprietary commercial product would work. It’s that they do nothing for the project but expect the world from it. That’s the problem.
I’ve got nothing against bug reports, infact I’ve made some myself, they help development. Demanding they are fixed is a different thing entirely.
Sorry if my previous comment sounded like an insult.
Why do you think this is even relevant? Again, does your attitude towards a run of the mill ticket change if you change who filed it? Why are you outraged because some random grunt from company A or B filed an issue instead of random joe X? Would you be commenting here if the very same person who filed the issue had done so with a personal account without identifying or disclosing their employer?
I’m sorry, where does ffmpeg demand contributions or retributions from anyone who downloads or distributes their project? Aren’t they explicitly distributing their work without asking anyone to do or give anything in return? I mean, isn’t that the whole point of FLOSS?
More surprisingly, we see guides on how to contribute to FLOSS projects which state in no uncertain terms that filing bug reports and even run exploratory tests to give feedback to maintainers counts as contributing to the project, but somehow you’ve flipped over even the core principles to make it sound like a cash grab.
You still are not reading what I said correctly. The problem is they said in the bug report that it is “High Priority”. That’s a bit pushy. It’s up to the maintainers to work out what’s “High Priority”. You completely missed the point.
Yeah way less pushing than most bug reports I see, but just sounds like a panicked guy
Yes certainly some nasty reports out there. Even the reviews that show up in GNOME software are a bit nasty
You are right, nothing is relevant except bootlicking corps
This is really not about “corps”.
You eager-to-be-outraged types are desperately trying to make a storm in a tea cup over a normal bug report filed among hundreds of bug reports.
Again, if you replaced the name of those filing the bug report with “random joe”, would you still have faked all this outrage? Would you throw the same tantrum if it was even any other business?
I’m not outraged, I’m telling you “Your position that they are acting normally, or ethically, or optimally or whatever your position is, is dumb.”
I don’t think the ffmpeg maintainer is complaining that Microsoft is using ffmpeg, rather that they are opening “high priority” bug reports based on customer complaints. This might be a high priority problem for Microsoft but that does not make it so for ffmpeg.
The license allows Microsoft to use ffmpeg but they aren’t entitled to demand free labor from the project. Really, no one is entitled to do so, but Microsoft being a large company who can definitely afford to put money or talent on the problem makes it only that much more egregious.
edit: I would note that asking for help or reporting a bug is usually welcome, the problematic part is demanding help because it’s a high priority issue for YOUR customers.
Users can only assign priority to issues they create themselves if they are explicitly authorized to assign priorities.
If you provide access to that field but then complain that bug reporters use that field, you’re complaining about how you misconfigured your service, not how end users are using it.
Are there any other people targeted in this sort of complain, or is a specific company being singled out just because some low-level grunt filled in a field in a bug report?
FYI they’re not a “low-level grunt”. The bug author’s job title is Principal Software Engineer at Microsoft with (at least) 18 years’ experience.
Completely disagree. This is how it works, Microsoft get software for free but they have no authority to prioritise other people’s scheduling
I don’t know where you’re getting the prioritization issue. Anyone in the world who is able to create an issue in a bug tracker can claim anything, but it’s always the people doing the bug triages who determine priorities. It means exactly as it means: nothing.
The “is this fixed yet” posts in bug reports by now is a meme in the floss world.
I think you’re trying too hard to find something to be outraged over.
They made a demand, based on a product launch time line. This is absurdly rude, abd basically treating open source like slave labor instead of commons.
If you read the same bug report I read, you wouldn’t make that claim. They expressed their personal needs, which are their own and theirs alone, and don’t extend beyond their personal roadmap.
The issue stated they found a bug that they had to get fixed. They said it was important to them for their own personal reasons. It’s laughable to describe what amounts to a run-of-the-mill bug report as “absurdly rude”.
Do you actually work on software for a living?
I’m sorry, what? Do you even pay attention to what you’re writing?
The scheduling demand thing is referring specifically to the project manager going “we need this for an upcoming major product launch, so you need to fix this before the launch.” It feels like Microsoft cracking the whip to try getting free labor, because it is.
If they truly can’t do without it for their product launch, they can fork it and fix the bug themselves. Surely Microsoft has the resources and brainpower to do so. But the PM didn’t want to do that, because it means they’d be spending their own time and resources on it.
But they have no whip to crack the guy literally just said please help
Imagine if you gave away some old clothes to some Charity and they called you and said “Some of the socks have holes in them and we need you to come over here and fix those holes ASAP because we want to sell them in our used clothes store”. What would be your reaction to that?
The expectation of payment is not for the software (which MS already has and is already using, free of charge, same as everybody else), it’s for getting priority in bugfix and maintenance work, or in other words, it’s for dictating other people’s work rather than merelly getting the product of work they, of their own choice and in their own timings, did and gave away for free.
Free software is a social relationship, not a business relationship: the users get what they get because somebody chose to put their own time into it and is giving it out for free. Such relationship does not entitle the recipients of the goodwill of others to make demands on their time, especially if said recipients are actually profiting from what those other people gave away. If they want the right to get to use other people’s time as they see fit, then they have to get into a business relationship and that’s only going to happen in business terms that both parties are willing to have.
Further, nobody is stopping MS from using their own programmers to fix that problem themselves.
I think your hypothetical scenario doesn’t match the issue being discussed in a few key aspects.
You’re giving old clothes with no expectation of return. Why then get pissed because someone is using your clothes without paying you for them?
Then,if you make it your point to put up a system for everyone to file tickets pointing problems with the clothes you’re giving away, why are you whining that the system is being used as it was designed to be used?
It’s perfectly fine if you feel the need to prioritize your work based on your criteria alone, and anyone else’s input is at most a suggestion. That’s what everyone expects of it, too. But don’t throw a tantrum when someone uses your work precisely as you told the world to use it.
The point of my comment seems to have missed you, turned around and done another pass and missed you again.
I don’t think you are able to grok the actual issue, which is a big corp demanding free work, then demanding a pittance to complete the work, then being buthurt when people refuse to work with them.
Where did they demand it?
Learn how to read man.
I guess I can’t so can you just quote it?
Nah, do the work yourself.
So is the real analogy …
You gave some old clothes to charity, expecting nothing back. However you spotted a lawyer wearing your old clothes so walked up and demanded money?
No no no lawyer came knocking at my door begging me to darn a sock
And of course you said “sorry but I can’t do that right now” and went on with your life , rather than jumping down his throat, then holding a grudge for 11 months?
If the dude was so tone deaf and myopic I’d post a bad review on yelp
I get that you’re dyslexic but take the time to read what was written before responding.
I’m just dumb, but I don’t see how what they said is wrong
Found the PM
It’s one thing to just use the software, it’s another to open bug tickets that you expect the maintainer to prioritise. It’s free software, the maintainer doesn’t have to do anything for you. If they want tickets fixed with high priority, they should work something out with the maintainer.
The problem isnt that ms was using it The problem is that ms wanted special treatment for free because of their timetable, which wasnt even ‘oh shit everything broke’ but for a fucking product launch as if the maintainers should care about that, treating a fucking charity like a contractor, and really highlighting how all this proprietary bullshit can only exist because of the work provided by open source people.
Microsoft needs to see serious consequences from the open source community for this.
They filed a bug report, with a reproducible bug.
Some guides on how to contribute to FLOSS projects even go as far as listing this as one of the main ways to contribute to projects.
But here you are, describing a run-of-the-mill bug report, filed among hundreds of bug reports, in a ticketing system explicitly opened to the public so that everyone and anyone in the world could file bug reports, as a request for “special treatment for free”.
Do you think every single person filing a bug report is asking to be given special treatment for free? Everyone’s bug is very important to them too. What makes you think this case is special or even any different?
The report of the bug is not the problem. The prioritization, reasoning for the prioritization, and demand that it be fixed quickly for their product launch was the problem.
The fact that when asked, they offered pay for a spot fix rather than maintenance, essentially abusing the Commons for corporate profit, and being super fucking rude about it, was the problem.
People in this thread are arguing otherwise.
Users filing tickets do not prioritize jack shit. That’s not how it works. At best they mention an issue is important to them. Not even in big corporations dealing with internal tickets things work like that. The responsibility of prioritizing work lies on the project owners, exclusively.
Literally what each and every single user affected by a problem asks in their bug reports.
Again, why do you feel this is something that warrants your outrage?
Okay so talk to one of them about it. I’m with you on this part. So bizzaire.
That’s not even the issue. Nobody cares that MS is using ffmpeg. It’s just rude to have as much money as MS does, integrate ffmpeg into one of their core products, then apparently not know anything about it and file hilariously bad bug reports that are actually just support requests after never contributing anything back.
Like, I’ve used ffmpeg probably since it was released. I’ve never given the ffmpeg developers anything, and I expect nothing in return from them. They don’t know me, they don’t know I exist, they don’t know I use their software. I could not reasonably file a support request as a bug like they did and expect to be taken seriously. Why does Microsoft get to have this expectation when they behave the same way? They’re a big company who asked ffmpeg to do extra work to support MS’s ignorance and laziness, and they didn’t even offer an ongoing support relationship. They wanted to throw a few grand at ffmpeg once to make the problem go away. This is completely ridiculous.
Literal nonsense. If someone abuses my bug tracker to act like a clown, I have every right to decline their support requests, even if I licensed my software open source. Nothing in open source philosophy requires you to bend over backwards to cater to every MS project manager’s poorly thought-out whims. You’re literally just making things up.
You surely haven’t been paying attention to this thread.
Seriously? Is this the argument you’re going with?
Unbelievable.
From what little we know, it looks like they used it correctly
Priority is guidance from the user. The maintainer always has the decision how they’ll respond. You could have said you don’t have time, you could have said it’s on my queue to look at later, you could have said you don’t provide support.
We’re talking about a hypothetical. I’m not the ffmpeg maintainer. The person got help in their thread and everything was courteous. I wouldn’t even be rude about it, I just wouldn’t hold their hand, and I might make a comment about the value of doing some legwork on your own when an update to a core dependency seems to break something. If this kind of behavior is considered sensible for a project manager at MS, then apparently I’m more qualified to manage projects than a lot of people at some of the largest corporations on Earth.
That is literally the opposite of what you were just saying. You were saying that open source developers can’t even complain when responsible people at gigantic corporations file dumb bug reports against their project.