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MongoDB switches up its open source license

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Re: MongoDB switches up its open source license

#13

I used to like permissive (OSI) licenses a lot more than restrictive licenses, but now I like copyleft better (for my own projects) because… 1. You’re still helping education, nonprofits, and individuals benefit from your work. 2. It’s still open source, so people will still be able to contribute and use your work in their own projects. 3. Companies that want to use your code to make money can do so, but only if they…

If it's not a library meant to be used by others, just put GPL (Commonwealthy) / EUPL (Not-Commonwealth) on it.

Re: MongoDB switches up its open source license

#14
post #4

At the outset, it sounds simple that MongoDB inc thinks why should some 3rd party cloud provider (AWS, GCP, DO and the like) be allowed to run MongoDB as a service and make money while MongoDB contributes the biggest part of the open source project that is MongoDB. But, it feels like yet another fallacy. What really is an open source project then? Say some developer X contributes to a project like MongoDB his/her ope…

I had the feeling that AWS and Azure are pushing their own NoSQL solutions and don't care much about MongoDB.

I heard that AWS offered mongo XX million dollars per year to have Mongo included as a backend for RedShift. They haven't touched it yet, because of its license.

Re: MongoDB switches up its open source license

#15
post #4

At the outset, it sounds simple that MongoDB inc thinks why should some 3rd party cloud provider (AWS, GCP, DO and the like) be allowed to run MongoDB as a service and make money while MongoDB contributes the biggest part of the open source project that is MongoDB. But, it feels like yet another fallacy. What really is an open source project then? Say some developer X contributes to a project like MongoDB his/her ope…

I had the feeling that AWS and Azure are pushing their own NoSQL solutions and don't care much about MongoDB.

Load balancers, DNS, DB, Virtualization ... a lot of those services on AWS are based on opensource software.

Re: MongoDB switches up its open source license

#16
post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had the feeling that AWS and Azure are pushing their own NoSQL solutions and don't care much about MongoDB.

A lot of AWS's managed services are just off the shelf open source projects on the backend. Amazon can afford to fork the project and poach top talent from your company. I think these moves are extremely short-sighted. Changing license models only causes instability in the overall ecosystem.

Why doesn't Amazon just pay mongodb? If you you hired some employees from mongo you would have to pay money.

Re: MongoDB switches up its open source license

#17

This is a bad move and does not inspire confidence. Instead of switching the license, they should have gone after companies that were abusing the terms of GNU AGPLv3 license.

Exactly; what makes them think changing the license is going to make an actor in bad faith change?

Re: MongoDB switches up its open source license

#18
I'm not an expert in licenses, could someone weight in and explain how the AGPLv3 was being abused? Did the mentioned companies follow the spirit of the license and were getting away with something the company didn't like or were they just improperly distributing the software, regardless of licensing terms? Also: "So while the SSPL isn’t all that different from the GNU GPLv3,(...) [it] explicitly states that anybody who wants to offer MongoDB as a service (..) needs to either get a commercial license or open source the service to give back the community."

Doesn't AGPLv3 already require open sourcing server side implementations?

Thanks in advance

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