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Relicensing React, Jest, Flow, and Immutable.js

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Re: Relicensing React, Jest, Flow, and Immutable.js

#131

Post by wolco »

Kilenaitor wrote: post #69
CydeWeys wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So the list of packages they're truly open sourcing is intentionally small, then. They're only truly open sourcing the ones that are very popular and that had a huge amount of outcry over the license. That makes it worse.

> That makes it worse. In what way does re-licensing their most popular packages make it worse? It says they're evaluating. Doesn't say no and as demonstrated here it doesn't mean they wont change their mind later.

What worries many is that they may change the license at a later

Re: Relicensing React, Jest, Flow, and Immutable.js

#132

Post by ballenf »

JamesFM wrote: post #63

Wait, this doesn’t solve anything. They replaced BSD with MIT, which are basically the same license and then they removed any explicit patent grant. So this means the user is actually granted less rights then before. Am I missing something or does this make zero sense?

There hasn't been a single patent covering a standard React implementation found yet. Someone found one that might cover a niche case, but the bottom line is no one really knows if any patents of any substance or having broad claims will actually ever issue.

That combined with the implied licenses means there was a patent clause causing a ton of unecessary hand-wringing.

The reality is every company of FB's size is patenting every developer's latest dump if it can get through the patent office.

Re: Relicensing React, Jest, Flow, and Immutable.js

#133

Post by JamesFM »

nostrademons wrote: post #98
JamesFM wrote: post #63

Wait, this doesn’t solve anything. They replaced BSD with MIT, which are basically the same license and then they removed any explicit patent grant. So this means the user is actually granted less rights then before. Am I missing something or does this make zero sense?

Implied patent licenses: https://www.wilmerhale.com/pages/publicationsandnewsdetail.a... https://copyleft.org/guide/comprehensive-gpl-guidech7.html Basically, if you sell or license a product that requires a patent to work, courts have generally held that you grant an implied patent license for any patents that the product might require. If you explicitly reference patents within the license, however, then whatever t…

This is highly confusing to me.

If implicit patent grants are a thing, why have more modern licenses like Apache 2 and GPL 3 made it a point to include explicit patents grants in the language of the license?

Wouldn’t their legal counsel advise them against it if it was redundant?

Re: Relicensing React, Jest, Flow, and Immutable.js

#134

Post by CydeWeys »

joshmanders wrote: post #90
Twirrim wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a strange claim given how many major projects have appeared on the front page of HN because of it, everything from the Apache foundation to Wordpress.

> everything from the Apache foundation to Wordpress. Those were the only two.

WordPress accounts for something like 19% of all websites, more so than any other single platform. Do not underestimate the importance of their decision.

Re: Relicensing React, Jest, Flow, and Immutable.js

#135

Post by carussell »

nojvek wrote: post #91
carussell wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> a win for the open source community as a whole I'm not sure how changing course from a direction that could have neutralized patents, to one engineered so patent aggressors aren't hurt, is something that can be considered a win for the open source community.

Because their licence gave Facebook the upper hand if they wanted to come after you. MIT is like a standard when it comes to OS. At big companies, complicated licencies are very hard to get approval of.

> Because their licence gave Facebook the upper hand if they wanted to come after you.

No it didn't. Facebook made a nothing-up-the-sleeve showing; you had recourse if they decided to "come after you", because your right to countersue was something that was explicitly protected in the PATENTS grant.

Removing the grant, on the other hand, contributes to a world where everyone else can come after you. That should be scarier, because the set containing entities who aren't Facebook is much larger than the set of entities who are. (And the latter set is much less likely to sue—virtually guaranteed not to sue, even—for the exact reason mentioned above.)

Re: Relicensing React, Jest, Flow, and Immutable.js

#138

Post by gcommer »

> Although we still believe our BSD + Patents license provides some benefits to users of our projects

I'm probably missing something, but: If their BSD+Patents was actually strictly "better" for the user, could they not just dual license under both? Is BSD+Patents ∪ MIT < MIT for some reason?

Re: Relicensing React, Jest, Flow, and Immutable.js

#139

Post by jrochkind1 »

CydeWeys wrote: post #38
sebastianmck wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

See the fourth paragraph. > This shift naturally raises questions about the rest of Facebook's open source projects. Many of our popular projects will keep the BSD + Patents license for now. We're evaluating those projects' licenses too, but each project is different and alternative licensing options will depend on a variety of factors.

So the list of packages they're truly open sourcing is intentionally small, then. They're only truly open sourcing the ones that are very popular and that had a huge amount of outcry over the license. That makes it worse.

I don't think it's fair to claim that it wasn't "truly open source". There isn't just one "truly open source" license. There are several. They obviously aren't all the same, that's why they are different licenses. People might have a reason to prefer one to another, but they are all "truly open source". People might even realize that there are some of them they can't use -- _many_ people have reasons they can't use the GPL, but that doesn't make it "not truly open source".

The Open Source Initiative's definition of "open source" doesn't say anything about patents: https://opensource.org/osd

I don't know if Facebook has asked the OSI to validate their "before" license as "open source." Perhaps if they did it would be controversial (or perhaps not), perhaps it would lead to OSI making more restrictions on what it will call 'open source', I dunno.

One version of a "BSD+Patents" license is approved by OSI, but not one involving a "retaliation" clause. https://opensource.org/licenses/BSDplusPatent

Anyway, I don't think you have any grounds to say that license was not "truly open source".

Re: Relicensing React, Jest, Flow, and Immutable.js

#140

Post by cies »

So which FB project still have a BSD+patents license.

I count:

* ReasonML - https://github.com/facebook/reason/blob/master/PATENTS.txt

* GraphQL - https://github.com/graphql/graphql-js/blob/master/PATENTS

* react-native - https://github.com/facebook/react-native/blob/master/PATENTS

* PlanOut - https://github.com/facebook/planout/blob/master/PATENTS

* Flow - https://github.com/facebook/flow/blob/master/PATENTS

* Haxl - https://github.com/facebook/Haxl/blob/master/PATENTS

* Flux - https://github.com/facebook/flux/blob/master/PATENTS

Just a few that I found.. Please reply if you know more project that are still BSD+PATENTS licensed.

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