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Explaining React's license

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Re: Explaining React's license

#181

Post by Lazare »

falcolas wrote: post #90
Lazare wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If Facebook has a patent on React, it's almost certainly going to be on the vdom concept. If Facebook has a patent on the vdom, then all the projects in your list violate the patent, and none of them come with even a conditional patent grant from Facebook. If Facebook does not have a patent on the vdom or other React technology, then those other projects are safe, but so is React , since termination of the patent gra…

Being sued, whether the patent is valid or not, is really expensive. Unless you're Google, or of similar size, you're going to lose just due to the costs. Using React just opens you up to liability, with no real benefit (other than using React). Why would you use it?

> Using React just opens you up to liability, with no real benefit (other than using React).

How?

Again, if they have a patent, they can sue you if you use one of the alternatives mentioned. If they don't have a patent, they can't sue you if you use React.

What's your thinking behind saying using React adds liability? Because to me, it looks like either it does nothing or it reduces liability.

Re: Explaining React's license

#182

Post by WalterSear »

kevinflo wrote: post #141
hajile wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You should probably steer clear of trademark infringement too. I was thinking something like free-dom myself.

Good point. Just switched it to rdom-open (first thing that popped in my head lol)

How about eact?

Re: Explaining React's license

#183

Post by paradite »

/s

Angular is terrible.

React is trojan horse.

Vue is developed by Chinese.

/s

And I honestly just want a decent framework to write JavaScript. Maybe the framework war is just getting started after all.

Edit: I'm just summarizing and projecting the sentiments around the popular frameworks and wondering about the future, not sure why I got so much hate...

Re: Explaining React's license

#184

Post by sheetjs »

EduardoBautista wrote: post #180
drieddust wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed and there is no reason to still stick with react when alternatives like vuejs and angular are available. Its not that great anyways when compared to angular 2/4. There are too many concepts to be mastered and it soon become overwhelming. I tried learning react but dropped it after spending a week when I still could not understand routing. Sense of cohesiveness between different concepts is missing. I believe s…

React Native is what I believe to be the big thing in the React community. I haven't hear of anything similar in the Angular or Vue ecosystems.

https://weex.apache.org/ is the closest thing for the Vue ecosystem

Re: Explaining React's license

#185

Post by reconbot »

khuey wrote: post #173
devdoomari wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

+1 on this. I'm going for Preact ( https://github.com/developit/preact ) for React alternative.

If React really is covered by patents Facebook has then Preact is likely infringing on them since it does the same things in similar ways. And Preact doesn't come with a patent grant from Facebook at all.

We learned from Java and Google that you can't patent and API. It's not forked from React it's an alternative.

Re: Explaining React's license

#186

Post by antoncohen »

DannyBee wrote: post #174
antoncohen wrote: post #129

Facebook's license is no more dangerous than regular MIT or BSD-style licenses. If you are OK with using MIT or BSD licensed software you should be OK with using Facebook's BSD + Patents software. Here is why: MIT and BSD licenses don't have any patent grants, unlike the Apache 2.0 license. If you use MIT/BSD open source software, and some functionality of that software is patented by the author, you could be sued fo…

"MIT and BSD licenses don't have any patent grants, unlike the Apache 2.0 license. If you use MIT/BSD open source software, and some functionality of that software is patented by the author, you could be sued for patent infringement. " Every single lawyer i've ever spoken to strongly believes implied licenses will protect you very well here. Like, among us open source lawyers, it's pretty much the one thing people ag…

> Once their is an explicit grant, any implicit grant you would have gotten is extinguished.

The BSD license grants explicit rights to use the software, thereby granting implicit rights to use the patents in the software while using the software as it is intended to be used.

The sentence "redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without modification, are permitted" doesn't go away because there is an "additional grant of patent rights".

Re: Explaining React's license

#187

Post by Lazare »

SAI_Peregrinus wrote: post #107
jaredklewis wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would patiently beg everyone to employ some basic reasoning. Situation A: React is licensed under BSD + PATENTS. You sue Facebook for infringing your widget patent. Turns out Facebook has a patent for something in react. They revoke your grant and counter sue you for infringing that patent. Long legal battle ensues. Situation A: React is licensed under just BSD. You sue Facebook for infringing your widget patent. T…

People are worried about Situation C: React is licensed under BSD + PATENTS. You sue Facebook (or any corporate affiliate of theirs) for infringing on your widget patent. Facebook revokes your react license and counter sues you for copyright infringement. The patents clause doesn't have anything to do with any patents on parts of React. It's a way for Facebook to make it so that anyone who wants to sue them for paten…

> People are worried about Situation C: React is licensed under BSD + PATENTS. You sue Facebook (or any corporate affiliate of theirs) for infringing on your widget patent. Facebook revokes your react license and counter sues you for copyright infringement.

This cannot happen. This is not a thing. Nobody is legitimately worried about this; anyone who is needs to take a deep breath and stop being ridiculous. This has been clarified many times.

(Source: The plain language of the license, multiple independent lawyers who have commented on this, Facebook's official license FAQ, etc. The BSD license does not terminate when the patent grant does.)

Re: Explaining React's license

#188

Post by Lazare »

reconbot wrote: post #185
khuey wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If React really is covered by patents Facebook has then Preact is likely infringing on them since it does the same things in similar ways. And Preact doesn't come with a patent grant from Facebook at all.

We learned from Java and Google that you can't patent and API. It's not forked from React it's an alternative.

The risk behind Preact isn't the API. Remember, this is a discussion about patents, so what matters is fundamental concepts and algorithms.

The most likely thing for Facebook to patent is the concept of a virtual DOM that's diffed to apply updates to the real DOM. IF they have such a patent (and apparently they don't), then any library that has a vdom implementation infringes, including Preact.

Of course, if they DON'T have such a patent (which seems to be the case), then Preact is safe, but so is React. :)

Re: Explaining React's license

#189

Post by ralmidani »

falcolas wrote: post #97
ralmidani wrote: post #72

For someone like me, (Free Software advocate, Ember user looking for a breath of fresh air--and better job prospects--with React), it all boils down to doing a cost-benefit analysis. Sweeping conclusions like "you have nothing to worry about" or "you should never use software with such a license" do not apply to everyone. As a Free Software advocate, I abhor troll-like behavior, regardless of whether the vehicle is p…

Is React really free software? It's free as in beer, but you have to give up a lot of rights completely unrelated to React in order to use it. Sure, it may never be a problem (it probably won't be a problem for 99.9% or more of those who use it), but who is willing to take that chance with the future of their company?

Facebook doesn't deny you the freedoms of using the software without restriction, studying it, modifying it, and distributing it (with or without your modifications).

I personally wish FB would release even more of their platforms as free software, preferably under (A/L)GPL3 or MPL 2 or Apache 2. But we do not live in a perfect world. Even the folks at FSF made some compromises regarding the wording of the patent provisions in the GPL3 family, in order to get more companies to adopt the licenses [0].

I am sure the folks at FB know the first time they abuse the patent stipulations, a lot of people using React will jump ship.

[0] https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/compromise.html

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