131–140 of 212 posts
I'm here to say that the Gutenberg team is going to take a step back and rewrite Gutenberg using a different library. It will likely delay Gutenberg at least a few weeks, and may push the release into next year. Just a few weeks? Is it that trivial to swap out a library?
People who ridicule the notion of FUD causing actual harm, pay attention: this is a perfect example of the chilling effects of FUD on software projects. Automattic didn't drop React because it doesn't like the license. Automattic dropped React because the FUD surrounding React's license might rub off on them (and WordPress). It's their right to do so and it's in the best interest of WordPress to avoid being dragged i…
The term "FUD" is typically used to denote " unreasonable " or " unfounded " fear/uncertainty/doubt. I'm not sure that it applies to situations where doubt is NOT unreasonable.
It doesn't, but it does apply to this situation because the fear etc. is unreasonable. Utterly. Either you have an explicit patent license or the entire PATENTS file becomes inoperative and you have exactly what you would have had with a plain BSD license. It's simple logic. Authority after authority, including Automattic's own counsel, has tried to explain in detail that patent law is not immune to logic. But still the FUD keeps coming, and it's harmful to open source because this is the exact same "why risk it" FUD that has been used against open source in general for years. It's the old Microsoft line returned from the dead, after Microsoft themselves have abandoned it to become pretty decent OSS citizens.
I don't understand why can't you just replace all React with Preact or Inferno-compat. That would take 2 minutes, wouldn't it?
If Facebook has patents covering React, these probably also cover Preact, so you'd actually be in a worse position: Potentially violating patents and not having any sort of grand.
People who ridicule the notion of FUD causing actual harm, pay attention: this is a perfect example of the chilling effects of FUD on software projects. Automattic didn't drop React because it doesn't like the license. Automattic dropped React because the FUD surrounding React's license might rub off on them (and WordPress). It's their right to do so and it's in the best interest of WordPress to avoid being dragged i…
Comfort can hurt. Automattic is not comfortable with the Facebook license and you say it like it's a baseless FUD but even if they get a 1% chance of going to court against Facebook then they rather not take that risk of litigation anytime in the future. It's a business decision for the long term as rewriting doesn't cost that much for them.
The license is ONLY a problem if you intend to initiate litigation against Facebook and can't swap out React (or a React-using product you rely on) with something else. Something tells me the number of companies that a) will ever be in a situation to sue Facebook over patents, b) rely on React or React-based products, c) don't already infringe upon any other Facebook patent without using React, AND d) would be severely harmed if sued over React patents, is exceedingly small.
Google, Amazon, Microsoft and Apple only fulfill conditions a and b (although React is non-vital to their businesses). Most startups only fulfill conditions b and d. In order to meet all four conditions, your company would have to be built entirely on React (or other FB open source technologies), be small enough not to be able to replace React, not infringe on any of the many other patents FB holds and yet somehow own patents FB infringes on and want to actively sue them.
Deciding against React because of the patent situation for most companies is the equivalent of worrying about someone stealing your second million before you have even made a single dollar.
People who ridicule the notion of FUD causing actual harm, pay attention: this is a perfect example of the chilling effects of FUD on software projects. Automattic didn't drop React because it doesn't like the license. Automattic dropped React because the FUD surrounding React's license might rub off on them (and WordPress). It's their right to do so and it's in the best interest of WordPress to avoid being dragged i…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't understand this: how are you not strictly better off with the patent grant? This whole fiasco seems to be nothing but FUD. See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14780979 tl;dr: License with no patent grant: Facebook can sue you for infringing patents, even if you are using a clone! License with patent grant: Facebook cannot sue you for infringing patents, unless you do it first.
There are two camps - those who believe that an open source license implicitly provides patent grants and those who believe an open source license does not allow patent use. Until such a thing is tested in court (in each country) both ideas have merit. The patent grant is also worded a bit unclearly - implying that if you sue facebook you will lose the copyright, not only the patent right, to use React. Even though t…
It's not unclear at all. Here's the file. Note that it's separate from the LICENSE file that grants a copyright license.
https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/master/PATENTS
> The license granted hereunder will terminate, automatically and without notice, ...
There is no reasonable logical or legal context in which "hereunder" refers to anything except the PATENTS file itself. What lawyers have had to clarify is what should never have been an issue because it was already clear. They're not the ones muddying the waters. Opponents are. We should be asking who is so determined to put this meme out there, and why.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The term "FUD" is typically used to denote " unreasonable " or " unfounded " fear/uncertainty/doubt. I'm not sure that it applies to situations where doubt is NOT unreasonable.
> I'm not sure that it applies to situations where doubt is NOT unreasonable. It doesn't, but it does apply to this situation because the fear etc. is unreasonable. Utterly. Either you have an explicit patent license or the entire PATENTS file becomes inoperative and you have exactly what you would have had with a plain BSD license. It's simple logic. Authority after authority, including Automattic's own counsel, has…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> baseless and meritless Are you expert in patent law for you to come up with that conclusion though? I you're not a lawyer then your assumption that it's a perfectly OK patent grant is baseless and meritless as well.
> I you're not a lawyer then your assumption that it's a perfectly OK patent grant is baseless and meritless as well. ...as would any non-lawyer's claim otherwise. Do you call them out the same way, or are you selective about where you apply that rule? In actual fact, it only takes a tiny bit of familiarity with patent law to see that a revocable grant can't be worse than no grant at all. Many engineers have such fam…
The last time the PATENTS file was changed was 3 years ago. It has passed the smell test for Microsoft (and dozens of other large companies) with literal buildings full of attorneys who have more experience with licenses, patents and everything between then most. This issue seems to be a bunch of nothing. What am I missing here?
