Dev.SN ♥ developers
Sections
Dev.SN
Angry Jesus writes:
There is a lot of snake oil in the audiophile world. A few years ago the pseudonymous NwAvGuy decided to do something about it. Not content to just criticize the hucksters, he designed a $130 headphone amp that competes with $1000 models. NwAvGuy released the design under the Creative Commons CC BY-ND license (attribution, no derivatives) and freely collaborated on revising it with multiple manufacturers looking to build and sell the amp. All he wanted was credit and to see that no one would take his design and degrade it with inferior modifications.
Then he disappeared. "In July 2012, NwAvGuy went silent. E-mails weren't returned, and blog posting ceased. 'He had gone quiet before -- for a month or so,' says Boudreau. But no one has heard a peep from NwAvGuy in more than a year and a half."
Since then some of the parts used in the last revision have been discontinued and one of the best values in high fidelity audio can't be manufactured anymore because NwAvGuy is no longer around to approve any changes.
(Score: 5, Informative) by mwvdlee on Wednesday March 26 2014, @05:43AM
I think the problem is mostly a legal one.
The license for the schematics were No-derivatives; you can use the schematic but you're not allowed to change it.
Some parts required for the original schematic are no longer available; the schematic as is can no longer be produced.
The only person legally able to change the schematic is nowhere to be found.
I'm sure there are plenty of people out there capable of updating the schematic, they're just not legally allowed to do so (atleast not publically).
(Score: 3, Interesting) by GeminiDomino on Wednesday March 26 2014, @08:54AM
If the copyright is recorded as belonging to a pseudonym (it would have to be, or we'd know for certain who the guy was), and he has passed away as some others in this thread have suggested, then what's to stop someone another EE from adopting the pseudonym, posting a fake excuse about his domain being pwned, and putting out some "officially revised" schematics?
"We've been attacked by the intelligent, educated segment of our culture"
(Score: 4, Interesting) by hubie on Wednesday March 26 2014, @09:32AM
Are you not allowed to swap compatible components in this license? What constitutes a change in design? I can see adding or removing components that change the functionality of the circuit, but you're not allowed to swap in a similar component for one that isn't made any more? What about a case, for instance, where you have four amplifiers in your design and you use four amplifier chips, but later a 4-in-1 amplifier chip comes out; I wonder, if you swap that one chip for the previous four, is that a disallowed change? This sounds odd to me.