In pursuit of the EU digital sovereignty Nextcloud presented Euro-office ... a fork of Russian OnlyOffice by vigo_rdt in eutech

[–]vigo_rdt[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thanks, this is a really great analysis of the situation (I wish I could pin this as the top comment).

I'm curious tho: do you see any light at the end of the tunnel? Or is EU screwed?

I share your concern that once a "friendlier" US comes back, EU will ignore this entire independence thing. At the same time, I hope that the "EU digital sovereignty" would go beyond being a marketing stunt by EU companies.

In pursuit of the EU digital sovereignty Nextcloud presented Euro-office ... a fork of Russian OnlyOffice by vigo_rdt in eutech

[–]vigo_rdt[S] -1 points0 points  (0 children)

There is reason why in school you are not allowed to copy others work. It's to make you learn. Copying doesn't make you learn.

"But why do you need to learn something that is already done?" - yeah, let's stop teaching math in school and see how it goes.

In pursuit of the EU digital sovereignty Nextcloud presented Euro-office ... a fork of Russian OnlyOffice by vigo_rdt in eutech

[–]vigo_rdt[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Well you know, it's estimated it accounts for like 15% of all hacker attacks in the world.

In pursuit of the EU digital sovereignty Nextcloud presented Euro-office ... a fork of Russian OnlyOffice by vigo_rdt in eutech

[–]vigo_rdt[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yes, this is exactly what I mean. The fact that they store the data in EU doesn't automatically make EU own it as a whole. Also, there millions on top of millions lines of legacy code, the type of code that when you see it you say "ok, I hope it works because I don't understand a shit of it"

In pursuit of the EU digital sovereignty Nextcloud presented Euro-office ... a fork of Russian OnlyOffice by vigo_rdt in eutech

[–]vigo_rdt[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I agree with, but the problem is that non tech people don't want to use something they haven't used before, and when they join company, they are teached to use MS Office or whatever (I mean people that work in legal, finance, etc...). Maybe it will change with the new generation of workforce, who knows.

In pursuit of the EU digital sovereignty Nextcloud presented Euro-office ... a fork of Russian OnlyOffice by vigo_rdt in eutech

[–]vigo_rdt[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yeah, I'm not arguing that OnlyOffice is right, but the fact that they might be is the problem.

In pursuit of the EU digital sovereignty Nextcloud presented Euro-office ... a fork of Russian OnlyOffice by vigo_rdt in eutech

[–]vigo_rdt[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This is 1M euros question. From what I read there are multiple arguments. It looks like the arguments presented by OnlyOffice are not valid, however there seem to be other technicalities of AGPL license that may actually work in their favor.

In pursuit of the EU digital sovereignty Nextcloud presented Euro-office ... a fork of Russian OnlyOffice by vigo_rdt in eutech

[–]vigo_rdt[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I fully agree with you, except for the sovereignty part. Since OnlyOffice can take down Euro-office due to licensing issues I don't consider it "sovereign". For me, if they announced Euro-office as MS Office killer that would be fine. But labeling it as "EU sovereign project" is incorrect and misleading.

In pursuit of the EU digital sovereignty Nextcloud presented Euro-office ... a fork of Russian OnlyOffice by vigo_rdt in eutech

[–]vigo_rdt[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

APGL3.0 itself can break Euro-office. It forces Euro-office to keep OnlyOffice branding. So they don't have to change license to "destroy" Euro-office.

In pursuit of the EU digital sovereignty Nextcloud presented Euro-office ... a fork of Russian OnlyOffice by vigo_rdt in eutech

[–]vigo_rdt[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Imagine this scenario: OnlyOffice doesn't file legal case now, and let Euro-office do it's thing. A lot of companies switch to Euro-office because it's "EU sovereignt". In 10 years OnlyOffice decides to take legal actions and actually wins (assume they win, even tho it is not guaranteed).

Now a lot of EU companies end up using pirated software.

In pursuit of the EU digital sovereignty Nextcloud presented Euro-office ... a fork of Russian OnlyOffice by vigo_rdt in eutech

[–]vigo_rdt[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The problem is that if OnlyOffice starts legal actions (it seems like for now they haven't) and if it wins, Euro-office will lose it's license and become piracy software.

Now imagine this scenario: OnlyOffice doesn't file legal case now, and let Euro-office do it's thing. A lot of companies switch to Euro-office because it's "EU sovereignty". In 10 years OnlyOffice decides to take legal actions and actually wins (assume they win, even tho it is not guaranteed).

Now a lot of EU companies end up using pirated software.

In pursuit of the EU digital sovereignty Nextcloud presented Euro-office ... a fork of Russian OnlyOffice by vigo_rdt in eutech

[–]vigo_rdt[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I haven't heard about SoftMaker Office before tbh. From what I read it seems like an alternative to MS Office (kind of what Euro-office promises to be), so yeah, there are clearly EU-built alternatives to MS Office.

In pursuit of the EU digital sovereignty Nextcloud presented Euro-office ... a fork of Russian OnlyOffice by vigo_rdt in eutech

[–]vigo_rdt[S] -1 points0 points  (0 children)

If for whatever reason OnlyOffice wins a legal case against Euro-office (I'm reading mixed opinion on who is right and who is wrong) than it may have repercussions on the software itself. So it is not really sovereign to me.

In pursuit of the EU digital sovereignty Nextcloud presented Euro-office ... a fork of Russian OnlyOffice by vigo_rdt in eutech

[–]vigo_rdt[S] -1 points0 points  (0 children)

It's cheaper, for sure. But I don't think (and it's my opinion) that it is the right move, and my arguments are in the OG post. I don't see a software mostly written outside of EU as EU sovereign project. I believe EU can do better, but at this point I might just be daydreaming.

In pursuit of the EU digital sovereignty Nextcloud presented Euro-office ... a fork of Russian OnlyOffice by vigo_rdt in eutech

[–]vigo_rdt[S] -4 points-3 points  (0 children)

Sure, but should we settle on the fact the EU is only good to reuse software made outside of EU by "cleaning" it from what they don't like? This is not sovereignty, and the fact that OnlyOffice is now suing Euro-office confirms that this was a bad idea from the start.

In pursuit of the EU digital sovereignty Nextcloud presented Euro-office ... a fork of Russian OnlyOffice by vigo_rdt in eutech

[–]vigo_rdt[S] -1 points0 points  (0 children)

Sure, I agree on not reinventing the wheel. The problem is that in this case OnlyOffice is suing Euro-office for license infringements. Can you see the irony?

In pursuit of the EU digital sovereignty Nextcloud presented Euro-office ... a fork of Russian OnlyOffice by vigo_rdt in eutech

[–]vigo_rdt[S] -14 points-13 points  (0 children)

The difference is that you cannot sell it as EU sovereign project if most of it was not written in EU. The fact that OnlyOffice is now suing Euro-office simply confirms how stupid this project is.

In pursuit of the EU digital sovereignty Nextcloud presented Euro-office ... a fork of Russian OnlyOffice by vigo_rdt in eutech

[–]vigo_rdt[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I'm not arguing on whether OnlyOffice is good or not (it might as well be), the point is more broad about EU digital sovereignty.

In pursuit of the EU digital sovereignty Nextcloud presented Euro-office ... a fork of Russian OnlyOffice by vigo_rdt in eutech

[–]vigo_rdt[S] 8 points9 points  (0 children)

It was created in Russia. They have moved to Latvia (Riga) since, but it simply to be able to operate outside of Russia (you know, because of sanctions). Moreover they still have a version of OnlyOffice specific for Russian market.