This thread is pointless. The admins have made their stance clear, and everything they posted now is just dancing around the issue. I didn't think I was that personally involved in this situation, but after reading some of these "answers", I actually felt insulted, it's like we're being talked to as if we're stupid or something.
How can you honestly say that? That is definitely not the stance you have taken. Taking no action is not the same as not supporting it. You are hosting that project. That is supporting it.
Not only that, you made the creator feel very much welcome here, with him going as far as calling someone a "troll" for giving him flak for his unoriginal design. Seriously... that guy blatantly copies a popular design from this own forum, then he has the hubris, the shamelessness, to call someone else a "troll". That is absolutely ridiculous. At this point, I honestly don't even know whether he's taking the piss, or he just lacks self awareness.
Right, because this whole time we were too dumb to understand that design comparisons are ultimately subjective. So yeah, I guess you are right when you say you haven't taken a stance when it comes supporting or not supporting clones, since nothing is objectively a clone. It's certainly irrelevant that almost any reasonable person would consider it a clone.
So what would it take? Would I literally have to use the exact same CAD file as the original to have it be considered a clone? Could I defend my design by claiming I used a different manufacturing process? Or simply that I offer different colours? Or that I submerged all the panels in a herbal infusion that gives the components inside better overclocks?
This stance is all about hiding behind technicalities. It is unproductive, plain and simple.
Hence me claiming that this thread is pointless. The admins are not going to change their stance because they are technically right. The Steck is technically only subjectively a clone of the Ghost. Congratulations.
I do wonder how the admins would act if there was more than the Steck right now... I wonder how they would act if the whole CC&P sub-forum was filled with subjective clones of every popular design out there. I have an inkling that they would suddenly change their stance.
But no matter, I don't it's ever gonna get to that point, neither are the admins (in fact, they are relying on that). After all, I don't think that many more people will have the brass neck to come here and post their project that blatantly copies some popular one. Maybe it'll happen again in a year or two, and some future and present members will end up having this same conversation. Heck, as far as I'm aware, this same situation may very well have happened before. Let the cycle continue.
