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Microsoft opens a "high priority" bug ticket in ffmpeg, attempting to leech the free labour of the maintainers (trac.ffmpeg.org)

submitted 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) by Sibbo@sopuli.xyz to c/programming@programming.dev

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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

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[–] beyond@linkage.ds8.zone 0 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (1 children)

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.

[–] lysdexic@programming.dev 0 points 7 months ago (1 children)

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.

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?

[–] otl@apubtest2.srcbeat.com 1 points 7 months ago

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.