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The contents of Winamp’s “open source” GitHub repository has been deleted after less than a month. This move happened after its owners, Llama Group, received criticism from the free and open-source software (FOSS) community for its highly restrictive license. The original GitHub release was under the Winamp Collaborative License (WCL) 1.0, which states No Forking: You may not create, maintain, or distribute a forked version of the software. The deletion seemingly occured after The Register contacted the developers regarding the inclusion of Shoutcast DNAS code and some codecs from Intel and Microsoft.
The Register shared that some GitHub users noted in the comments of the project that this license actually violates the platform’s terms of service, and that the repository upload isn’t actually open source. This license was eventually revised to WCL 1.0.1, which changed the line to No Distribution of Modified Versions: You may not distribute modified versions of the software, whether in source or binary form. This means you can now build upon the code that Winamp uploaded to GitHub, but you won’t be able to share it with anyone. So, while the Winamp source code was online for all the world to see, it’s wasn't fully open source, as you cannot freely redistribute the modifications you make.
Aside from these licensing shenanigans, other GitHub users also noted that there were a few bits of code in Winamp’s release that it didn’t own (or didn’t own anymore) to begin with. The Register says this includes the server code for Shoutcast Distributed Network Audio Server (DNAS), which was originally developed by Nullsoft, the original owners of Winamp. The Llama Group eventually bought Winamp and Shoutcast, but it sold the latter to Azerion in 2022, meaning it doesn’t have the rights to the Shoutcast DNAS anymore. Proprietary Microsoft and Intel source code were spotted in the repository as well, which could potentially land the Llama Group in hot water with these giants.
It's likely because of these issues that it took down the Winamp repository from GitHub, and that we’re unlikely to see any form of Winamp — classic or otherwise — in any open-source platform. This legacy media player is just too old, with many proprietary bits and pieces coming from several other companies that won’t be too keen to see their code released to the world for free. It would take a massive investment and a lot of time to clean up Winamp’s back-end for an open-source release, but would anyone do it, knowing they wouldn’t make back a cent?
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