Caring about Rybka as a derivative

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BB+
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Caring about Rybka as a derivative

Post by BB+ » Sat Jan 29, 2011 1:30 am

Not often I would pick a specific quotation from TalkChess and disagree with it, but I think this one mis-leads a bit too much:
If you have been following anything for the past several years now, almost nobody cared about whether Rybka was a derivative or not until the controversy over the clones got real hot.
Here is a selection of "caring" (prior to Oct 2009) about whether Rybka was a derivative, already some from Dec 2005, then picking up again more than a year later (Jul 2007) when Strelka came about, and then again some months later, after time had seen more evidence become extractable. Due to forum limitations in links, I list the URLs w/o linking.

http://www.stmintz.com/ccc/index.php?id=469130 Rybka: How much Fruit is inside (Dec 11 2005)
http://www.stmintz.com/ccc/index.php?id=486910 The Rybka Flamewar & question for Vasik (Feb 2006) [e.g. "Evaluation of Rybka is very close to Fruit. He added some and lobotomized other things."]
http://talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=14985 position : strelka (probably equals) rybka (not eq) fruit (Jul 2007) ["When people said rybka was a clone of fruit, i used this position to suggest otherwise."]
http://talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=15073 In as few words as possible (Jul 2007) [About Fruit/Rybka/Strelka and the Gnu GPL]
http://talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=15035 Equal treatment (Jul 2007) [Szots asking if we will ask for our money back if Rybka is shown to be a Fruit clone -- this was after Osipov dropped that "bombshell"]
http://talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=18873 Something very strange [Strelka] (Jan 2008) [Corbit asks how Strelka can straddle both Fruit and Rybka, and responders point out the "obvious"]
http://talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=20526 The inside story on Rybka (Apr 2008) [Rick Fadden appears, mostly concerned with the node counting, though others pick up the Fruit trail -- incidentally Corbit had claimed already in Oct 2007 that FL was "making a careful examination" of the Strelka issue]
http://talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=20936 Strelka Reverse Engineered from Rybka: Details Examined (May 2008) [Rick Fadden is back with more Strelka/Rybka information -- perhaps the most interesting for the context here is Sherwin's statement "I agree with Fabien that Strelka is not a clone of Fruit and by extention, Rybka is not then a clone of Fruit"]
http://talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=23095 Fruit 2.1 vs Strelka 2.0 (Aug 2008) [from Norman Schmidt -- relevant as Strelka<->Rybka is already assumed by many]
http://talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=23118 Rybka 1.0 vs. Strelka (Aug 2008) [ZW makes the explicit Rybka/Strelka link -- there are multiple other threads here that I omit]
http://talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=24047 rybka 1.0 and plaggerism: has the case been compiled yet (Oct 2008) [asking where the investigation has gone in the last month]
http://talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=24504 Strelka = Rybka 1.0 =Fruit 2.1 = Toga?? Oh how disappointing (Oct 2008) [last thread before a lull for awhile]
http://talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=25219 Vas taken to the Popular Court, again? (Dec 2008) [Fernando decrying how ridiculous this constant threads are becoming...]
http://talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=26707 My challenge to the cloning accusers (Feb 2009) [more yabbering about nothing...]
http://talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=26644 On discussing clones (Feb 2009) [trying to set rules for discussion]
http://talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=27934 POLL: Do you believe Rybka is a derivative work program? (May 2009)
http://talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=28833 Evidence Rybka Is/Isn't A Derivative Work (Jul 2009)

In many of these periods, there were various posts about how CCC was being inundated by "clone" talk. Again I stress the above is just a selection, as I couldn't be bothered to locate every thread that touched on the Rybka/Fruit issue.

So I find the above quoted claim to be rather difficult to support.

OTOH, I agree with much of what DD says, in particular that GB is, in his own way, somewhat consistent --- he just chooses the relevant expertise to apply in what I would call a rather peculiar manner.

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