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No Radical Changes in GNU Project

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Re: No Radical Changes in GNU Project

#101

Post by Ironlikebike »

swsieber wrote: post #54
shadowgovt wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a complicated question, but I think the real decline of true free software commons was probably around the time cloud services proved so valuable. Cloud provides huge leverage to some end-users for getting to the goal of doing the thing they want to do with the software, and it utterly side-steps the Four Freedoms via the simple expedient of "You don't own the hardware the software runs on." GNU hasn't had an an…

Well, AGPL was the answer to that issue, but it hasn't really done much. I think part of the impact was things like GitHub recommending the MIT license.

My understanding is that the AGPL is an answer to an older problem and didn't see the cloud coming. It addressed those running web-hosted GPL licensed applications who were side-stepping the viral aspect of the GPL by claiming that they were not "technically" distributing a binary by making the application available on the internet as an executing web app.

The AGPL requires those who create web applications derived from the AGPL (whether they're distributed as binaries or not) to make the code for their web applications available.

The AGPL does not address the cloud-hosting conundrum at all. This conundrum is where a cloud hosting company (e.g. Amazon AWS) can replicate the original author's service offering using the unmodified open source tool (wrapping it and interacting via API at most), and undercut the original author's business model. I.e., you can imagine a power user of some AGPL software competitively putting the software author's company out of business.

This is the reason for the recent licensing restrictions around ElasticSearch and MongoDB. The originating companies have had their hosted service revenue models undercut by Amazon AWS offerings that simply repackaged the software as part of their cloud offering.

Making the AGPL even stronger by adding in a viral API clause would pigeon hole AGPL software to only the most fringe ideological use-cases as everyone would be afraid to run AGPL software in a business context.

Re: No Radical Changes in GNU Project

#102

Post by saagarjha »

tjr wrote: post #55
shadowgovt wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a complicated question, but I think the real decline of true free software commons was probably around the time cloud services proved so valuable. Cloud provides huge leverage to some end-users for getting to the goal of doing the thing they want to do with the software, and it utterly side-steps the Four Freedoms via the simple expedient of "You don't own the hardware the software runs on." GNU hasn't had an an…

I think the GNU response is more subtle than "boycott it". In particular, I do not get the impression that GNU opposes someone using software that runs on someone else's server machine in general . One obvious example would be an HTTP server with PHP scripts, or whatever. The software running on the remote server could even be proprietary software! For the sake of the person running the server, they should not use pr…

> The software running on the remote server could even be proprietary software! For the sake of the person running the server, they should not use proprietary software, but if it is running on their machine and not yours, then it is not your responsibility, and (as I understand the GNU position) not wrong for you to access that software.

I'd expect them to prefer you to use free software on the server, licensed under the AGPL.

Re: No Radical Changes in GNU Project

#103

Post by beachy »

swsieber wrote: post #83
favorited wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We all have friends we disagree with, but Ellen deserves catching shit for palling around with a guy who started a war that killed nearly 5 thousand American soldiers and hundreds of thousands of civilians for absolutely nothing.

Americans started a war that killed nearly 5 thousand American soldiers and hundreds of thousands of civilians for absolutely nothing. We're all pretty much complicit. If there's any smaller group to be mad at, I'd say it's anybody who didn't oppose that course, but more likely, the U.S. military complex. Ironically, she didn't catch flack for George being president of the Iraqi war, she caught flack for George's sta…

Copy pasting the same comment over and over does not help make your point.

Re: No Radical Changes in GNU Project

#104

Post by 29083011397778 »

claudiawerner wrote: post #93
endianswap wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"I am skeptical of the claim that voluntarily [sic] pedophilia harms children." https://stallman.org/archives/2006-mar-jun.html#05%20June%20...

"Many years ago I posted that I could not see anything wrong about sex between an adult and a child, if the child accepted it. Through personal conversations in recent years, I've learned to understand how sex with a child can harm per psychologically. This changed my mind about the matter: I think adults should not do that. I am grateful for the conversations that enabled me to understand why." https://stallman.org/…

Cue somebody pointing out how recent this is; then followed by a rebuttal pointing out the phrase recent years, and that while the post may be new, the change of heart may not be

Re: No Radical Changes in GNU Project

#105

Post by sounds »

shadowgovt wrote: post #85
sounds wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cloud services are actually still very fragile and vulnerable to being replaced. (Granted, it will be annoying and painful to find new ways to do things like search the web, manage files/emails, or stream videos, but I think those can all be solved from the technical side.) About the time the proprietary OS was finally declared dead, new competitors arose with convenient, cheap solutions that made money exactly becau…

The significant difference between free vs. proprietary OS and free vs. proprietary cloud are around responsibility and cost. A person can hack away on a free version of an OS for cost of labor and electricity, and making a mistake on one's personal OS build tends to have a "blast radius" limited to the individual user (or perhaps an enterprise relying on whatever software that OS was running). Running a free (as in…

I don't think a Free Software version of what we now call the cloud has to slice the responsibilities the same way.

(Reductio ad absurdium) GNU hackers creating an AWS clone? Not gonna happen.

I have paid close attention to conversations that Ed Snowden brought up around his attempts to convince Glen Greenwald to use and trust PGP.

The Free Software movement will someday have an improvement on PGP. When average ordinary people such as Glen Greenwald can use it, that part is done. Part of what?

And... let's argue about what to call it!

Free Cloud? Nah, too conformist.

GNU's Non-Cloud? The acronym GNC is already taken and besides, it's unpronounceable.

Shout out to https://plausible.io/ even though they use the MIT license.

Re: No Radical Changes in GNU Project

#106

Post by ghaff »

Ironlikebike wrote: post #101
swsieber wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, AGPL was the answer to that issue, but it hasn't really done much. I think part of the impact was things like GitHub recommending the MIT license.

My understanding is that the AGPL is an answer to an older problem and didn't see the cloud coming. It addressed those running web-hosted GPL licensed applications who were side-stepping the viral aspect of the GPL by claiming that they were not "technically" distributing a binary by making the application available on the internet as an executing web app. The AGPL requires those who create web applications derived f…

The AGPL covers the cloud use case insofar as, if a cloud provider takes the AGPL-licensed code, adds additional features, and offers it as a service it would have to add those additional features. (And, potentially, other code that interacts with the AGPL-licensed code; the boundaries are a bit unclear.)

Of course, the desire is to keep AWS from offering even just a fully-compatible competing service. But that would 1.) require APIs to be copyrightable and 2.) would, as you suggest, make that software pretty much unusable for most cases.

You're right that the AGPL largely pre-dated the cloud providers although the direction things were going in was reasonably clear.

Re: No Radical Changes in GNU Project

#108

Post by asjw »

zimbatm wrote: post #79
jgon wrote: post #19

I don't want to get into the weeds discussing the ins and outs of the various things that have happened with RMS and the FSF. I have my own opinions on whether or not these moves were warranted. Separate from that I guess my largest worry is that this is another step on the road to a complete neutering of the Free Software movement, and the increasing corporate enclosure of the software commons. The one thing I feel…

RMS is too black and white. It was probably a good thing to get the project started but I believe that it's counter-productive now. It's a bit like some people are good founders, but then you need a proper CEO to run the company. Having the project switch leader might actually be a good thing for the GNU project. But like you said, we'll see where it goes, it might not be all bad.

Th FSF is not a company.

It's like saying that the Pope is too religious...

Re: No Radical Changes in GNU Project

#110

Post by ghaff »

eitland wrote: post #65
swsieber wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, AGPL was the answer to that issue, but it hasn't really done much. I think part of the impact was things like GitHub recommending the MIT license.

Also you can ask 20 honest developers what they think AGPL means and get 3 or more wildly different explanations, at least if you include "I've no idea except it also works lver the network".

The meaning seems pretty clear. It's like the GPL but distribution now also encompasses offering the software over the network in the form of a service.

What's less clear is what defines the boundaries between AGPL-licensed software and the rest of your stuff making up whatever you're offering. This isn't always 100% clear with the GPL either but the GPL meaning of distribution is pretty tightly tied to traditional Unix methods of combining code which are mostly unambiguous.

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