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AWS forked my project and launched it as its own service

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Re: AWS forked my project and launched it as its own service

#431

Post by zymhan »

iso1631 wrote: post #323
tinus_hn wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because it’s a great idea but for instance the Linux kernel would have to come with documentation that mentions the tens of thousands of authors. A massive undertaking that doesn’t help anyone, really.

Something like https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/lin... ?

I'm just venturing a guess here, but on older BSD systems, weren't the license and credits printed on startup?

At least, I've seen the Copyright notice for the California Board of Regents in the macOS startup debugging.

Re: AWS forked my project and launched it as its own service

#432

Post by LockAndLol »

frabert wrote: post #2

If you don't like the terms of the license for software you released maybe you should have chosen a different one.

Would a restrictive open-source license even have stopped them? Would any American court fine an American mega-company over something like this?

How does that even work, anyway? If the developer were outside of America, would it still have to be taken to the country where the company resides? There's no international court I know of that would handle these kind of things.

Re: AWS forked my project and launched it as its own service

#433

Post by dalbasal »

ivanbakel wrote: post #337
monsieurbanana wrote: post #275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you also dislike interacting with people, seeing how there's no such thing as an exhaustive list of things to do and not to do? This is not even an analogy, it's what is being discussed. AWS didn't do anything illegal with regards to their usage of open-source, but we live in a society, and we do have innumerable tacit rules. One of them is that you should give credit to where credit is due.

Software licensing already breaks many tacit rules that people normally take for granted. It's rude to copy someone else's creation without asking first - but if they license their code in a way that allows for copies to be created, it is no longer rude to copy that code without permission. It is also rude to sell someone else's work without permission. But if they choose a software license without a non-commercial c…

IDK... lets remember that this is a low stakes game. At worst, someone is now cross with aws product people.

Also, it's not like we're talking about arcane pleasantries that no one could have anticipated. Say JKRR opens Harry Potter, copyleft or something. You record an audio version and sell it with great success. Is it not obviously courteous to mention her in some way?

It's even moreso, if you are aws, and JKR is just a regular author.

It's not like anyone who uses a library is expected to perform a ritual dance. It's common sense basics and if you get it wrong nothing happens. Doesn't seem like a lot to ask.

Re: AWS forked my project and launched it as its own service

#434

Post by craftinator »

mlyle wrote: post #302
xtracto wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Funny, these kind of threads sound similarly to how some companies I have worked for sound when talking about working on Saturdays: Me: Do we have to come to work on Saturdays? Boss: You dont HAVE to... but you know, people come and do work to go the extra mile. Me: Ok, but If I don't come, there's no problem right? Boss: Well, no, there's no problem. But you know, there's lots of work and it is great when people pus…

So you're saying the only courtesies we should render to others in life are ones that we're duty-bound by license agreements or other contracts to give? Out with social norms and niceties, and in with black letter law? I don't want to legally demand a specific acknowledgement; I know that this can have unintended consequences and greatly complicates adoption. Also: If my stuff is used at the periphery of something yo…

Yeah, as long as my company will double my pay when I ask for it as a courtesy, I'll come in on my days off as a courtesy. Tit tat

Re: AWS forked my project and launched it as its own service

#435

Post by suyash »

funkaster wrote: post #411
EpicEng wrote: post #393

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>this big co strategy of "mine. I profit now. everyone who built up this useful thing can suck eggs" really sucks and sucks for the humans and sucks for Open Source. Then use a different license. Hoping that a company like Amazon finds it in their hearts to always do what _you_ consider "the right thing" is just a loser of a strategy. You seem to want all of the good of open source, with none of the downsides. Good l…

This is what people don't get when arguing against GPL: "oh, it's such a restrictive license! so viral, blah blah blah". In this case, it would've probable not changed the outcome, but could give the author some leverage for either compensation or mention. IANAL, but my understanding is that GPL would require you to keep the same terms and mention explicitly the original source.

I would bet AWS wouldn’t even touch it if it was under GPL, most companies have made it forbidden to use because of reasons you stated.

Re: AWS forked my project and launched it as its own service

#436

Post by ghaff »

bhhaskin wrote: post #391
ManBlanket wrote: post #372

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does it not muddy the waters when an open source project is outright appropriated as a paid service?

Not really. There are a lot of open source licenses. If you care about that sort of thing then choose a license that doesn't allow it for commerical use.

There is no open source license [1] that prohibits commercial use.

[1] Specifically, no OSI-approved open source license but that's what most people equate with "open source license."

Re: AWS forked my project and launched it as its own service

#437

Post by Rebelgecko »

franklampard wrote: post #356
thayne wrote: post #319

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, yes, he is acknowledged in a text file that almost no one will read. Obviously there is no legal requirement, but would it be that hard for Amazon to include a "forked from..." or "built off of...", etc. to the announcement and product pages, if it really is heavily based off of another work?

Can you show me an example of any other project released from FAANG doing that? Curious what the expectations are.

There's probably oodles. Off the top of my head, there's Apple's web page for X11. Except for a spinal tap joke, the whole first section of the page was devoted to the acknowledgement that they were building on top of OSS from XFree86.

Re: AWS forked my project and launched it as its own service

#438

Post by suyash »

tnolet wrote: post #331
mjasay wrote: post #297

I run the open source strategy and marketing team at AWS. As I told Tim privately and publicly ( https://twitter.com/mjasay/status/1317084448119169024 ), I hadn't been aware of this but am talking with the relevant product team to see how we can improve in his regard. AWS uses a lot of open source, and we contribute a lot, both in terms of code (first-party projects like Firecracker and Bottlerocket, but also third-p…

OP here. Matt and I are chatting about this. We will work it out. As per my tweet, it's not about the letter of the licensing, it's about the spirit.

Do let us know what comes out of it in a blog as there are many other people like you out there.

Re: AWS forked my project and launched it as its own service

#439

Post by cycloptic »

EpicEng wrote: post #393
masukomi wrote: post #346

I really wish, that when COs like Amazon decided to productize a thing they either offered the core developer(s) enough $ to work on it full time (if they wanted) or a job to do that with a guarantee that as long as it was a product, and they wanted to work on it, they'd be allowed to continue. Problem with offering job is the likelyhood of getting redirected to some other unrelated work. instead of forking they coul…

>this big co strategy of "mine. I profit now. everyone who built up this useful thing can suck eggs" really sucks and sucks for the humans and sucks for Open Source. Then use a different license. Hoping that a company like Amazon finds it in their hearts to always do what _you_ consider "the right thing" is just a loser of a strategy. You seem to want all of the good of open source, with none of the downsides. Good l…

>Hoping that a company like Amazon finds it in their hearts to always do what _you_ consider "the right thing" is just a loser of a strategy.

Sure the author can't require payment after the fact, but there are no open source licenses that prevent the author from soliciting payment from a downstream user. This is all fair game.

>You seem to want all of the good of open source, with none of the downsides.

If you do it right there aren't downsides. As far as business is concerned, the point with choosing any license is to create a win-win situation for all parties involved.

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