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Relicensing CockroachDB

cockroachlabs.com

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Re: Relicensing CockroachDB

#91

Post by archit3cture »

It is nice to see that CockroachDB's team keep their original vision of creating a long term open source "commons" of their database.

What I don't totally understand when I take my developer's hat is why the split between "enterprise" features under CCL and core features under APL/BSL is kept. Without the "enterprise" features, CRDB does not feel like beeing totally open source and open source users are sort of second-zone users.

Are open-source fans supposed to write clean-room implementations of the features (would it even make sense in the licencing model CRDB uses) ?

It would also be nice to have a licencing clause where a change of ownership of CockRoach Labs or the bailout of the company would trigger a licence change for the enterprise features (maybe even after N years).

But as I said congrats on the product and all the best in your commercial endeavour ! may this licence change open new cloud opportunities !

Re: Relicensing CockroachDB

#92

Post by staticassertion »

gtirloni wrote: post #73

CockroachDB is an excellent project but it doesn't have the massive adoption that would prompt AWS/Azure/GCP to implement it as a managed service. Companies are much more likely to just go with AWS Aurora than to consider CockroachDB at this point. I'm still amazed as how promising open source projects continue to undermine themselves with this "commons clause" movement. I hope something good comes out of it but I'm…

Why would this undermine their efforts? It seems totally reasonable to say "You can't just sell a hosted version of this yourself". Anyone who was planning to use Cockroach still can, it even seems that you could be a CockroachDB shop that provides consulting services, so long as you don't manage and host it.

Re: Relicensing CockroachDB

#93

Post by alfonsodev »

nradov wrote: post #25
gonehome wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It'd be interesting if there was a way to specifically require AWS, Azure, Google Cloud (or more generally any cloud hosting reseller) to pay if they use the open source software or any derivative of it (or if they create any company which then uses it) for the purposes of reselling it to others. Basically give the open source project a 30% cut if you're going to resell it (or fork and resell it). It might be hard to…

You can put any license on your software that you want, but a license that required revenue sharing wouldn't really count as "open source".

I understand what you mean and totally agree with you, I just feel the need to remind (not to you) the term free software, as many things are open source but not free software [1]

[1] https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point....

Re: Relicensing CockroachDB

#94

Post by sangnoir »

batbomb wrote: post #72
gonehome wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It'd be interesting if there was a way to specifically require AWS, Azure, Google Cloud (or more generally any cloud hosting reseller) to pay if they use the open source software or any derivative of it (or if they create any company which then uses it) for the purposes of reselling it to others. Basically give the open source project a 30% cut if you're going to resell it (or fork and resell it). It might be hard to…

The $100MM Revenue License... Once your company surpasses $100MM in revenue you have to negotiate licensing terms.

How many engineers can be paid from $100MM revenue?[0] The *aaS company might be better served by employing engineering team to maintain their fork/API-compatible clean-room implementation a-la Amazon Aurora.

0. If company is profitable and licensing costs > overall salaries + monetary value of controlling roadmap.

Re: Relicensing CockroachDB

#95

Post by DoofusOfDeath »

xwdv wrote: post #50

I’m still not sure why people open source great products then get outraged that someone else would simply resell the product and make money off of it, possibly even more than them. When I put something out as open source, I’m doing it fully aware that I am leaving money on the table, but it will be worth it if a community of maintainers springs up around the project and ends up making it far better and more useful th…

> I’m still not sure why people open source great products then get outraged that someone else would simply resell the product and make money off of it, possibly even more than them.

Perhaps I didn't look at the right comments, but I'm not sensing outrage from the community.

The vibe I'm feeling is, "Bummer, that's another approach to funding OSS development that's having trouble. I hope we can find a good alternative."

Re: Relicensing CockroachDB

#97

Post by slavik81 »

didibus wrote: post #63

Could someone say just take a normal open source license, like MIT, and just add a provision saying, if you are Amazon, Google, Microsoft, this license doesn't apply to you and you are not permitted to use the code in any way? Basically, just blacklist certain companies that compete with you directly.

A blacklist would not be very effective. The companies you list could contract out the running of the database to someone who isn't blacklisted, or even just another company that they own.

Re: Relicensing CockroachDB

#98

Post by sangnoir »

k__ wrote: post #64

I had the impression cloud providers like AWS would move to using their own core services to emulate other systems and not host the original thing.

They already have - Amazon has Aurora, which has MySQL and Postgres compatibility. I'm sure if there's enough demand, Amazon will add CockroadDB compatibility to Aurora in the not-too-distant future.

Re: Relicensing CockroachDB

#99

Post by gtirloni »

staticassertion wrote: post #92
gtirloni wrote: post #73

CockroachDB is an excellent project but it doesn't have the massive adoption that would prompt AWS/Azure/GCP to implement it as a managed service. Companies are much more likely to just go with AWS Aurora than to consider CockroachDB at this point. I'm still amazed as how promising open source projects continue to undermine themselves with this "commons clause" movement. I hope something good comes out of it but I'm…

Why would this undermine their efforts? It seems totally reasonable to say "You can't just sell a hosted version of this yourself". Anyone who was planning to use Cockroach still can, it even seems that you could be a CockroachDB shop that provides consulting services, so long as you don't manage and host it.

Simply because if I'm using CockroachDB and don't want to manage it myself, my only option is Cockroach Labs.

While they are experts in the technology they've created, offering a managed service is much more than just having awesome developers. Not to mention some companies have other restrictions (on premises, local presence, etc, etc, etc).

For a customer, unless I'm completely sold on their technology and really need it for my company, they just added a restriction on my choices.

Re: Relicensing CockroachDB

#100

Post by im_down_w_otp »

quotemstr wrote: post #52

So they're taking their product proprietary. They're not the first to try this move. They won't be the last. It never works. This change guarantees one of two outcomes: 1) CockroachDB becomes irrelevant, as cloud providers stop providing it, or 2) a FOSS implementation of CockroachDB's API (perhaps based on the last FOSS CockroachDB release) becomes dominant.

3) The cloud provider forks at the version under the previous license, continues to iterate on it by adding valuable features that are exposed to users, which the OSS version won't have, and now the OSS vendor is playing both marketplace & technical catch-up at the same time and with each reinforcing the downside of the other. Effectively forcing original innovator into the position of being a fast-follower.
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