AWS forked my project and launched it as its own service • Hacker News Board

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

#441

Post by lolsal » Fri, Oct 16, 2020, 5:54 PM UTC

zelly wrote: post #388

cmaker10 wrote: post #48

Could everyone take a moment here and reflect on their hostile attitude towards an open source author who just wants to be treated fairly (in a moral sense)? My guess is that none of the people who are lecturing and gloating have ever written anything substantial. Shame on you.

Not hostile. Just pointing out the hypocrisy of embracing "openness" and "free software" that anyone could use freely, then getting mad when someone does use it. Also it's funny to see the FOSS crowd rediscover the need for intellectual property, having denounced it when it was applied in the opposite direction.

Thank you for saying what I could not articulate.

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

#442

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Oct 16, 2020, 5:54 PM UTC

SquishyPanda23 wrote: post #429

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. I think the software community is having an "I never thought the leopards would eat my face" moment. The community pushed for a long time for licenses that donated labor to corporations because the licenses sounded more "free", and that flattered their…

[deleted]

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

#443

Post by gozzoo » Fri, Oct 16, 2020, 5:54 PM UTC

unreal37 wrote: post #325

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…

Good job taking responsibility, Matt. Handling this the right way. I do think there's a larger discussion about trillion dollar companies just forking a project and announcing it as a new feature for their platform without even talking to the original creator. If there's anything to improve, "reach out first" will be a start. It's open source. You don't have to reach out. There's nothing legally or morally wrong with…

It doesn't sound exactly like taking responsibility to me. It's more an acknowledgment of the fact and damage control. Taking responsibility would suggest admitting fault and taking action to make things right. His statement doesn't have any of these. 'I am looking into it' is too vague and doesn't mean much.

Probably Amazon's legal department doesn't let him say much more, but then his statement sounds unconvincing and doesn't serve the purpose of taking responsibility and assuring the comunity of their good intentions.

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

#444

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Oct 16, 2020, 5:54 PM UTC

iso1631 wrote: post #330

Xylakant wrote: post #247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The primary problem is that 4-clause BSD is incompatible with the GPL since it adds restrictions to distributing the software (notably the advertising clause)

GPL3 allows for advertising clauses -- e.g. in flowplayer https://github.com/flowplayer/flowplayer/blob/dev/LICENSE.md "The GPL requires that you not remove the Flowplayer logo and copyright notices from the user interface. See section 5.d below."

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

#445

Post by Gehinnn » Fri, Oct 16, 2020, 5:55 PM UTC

sequoia wrote: post #423

Zenbit_UX wrote: post #410

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> How is it fair to expect other parties to meet your secret expectations? > What did AWS do wrong here? Were they supposed to know this guy's unwritten expectations? I suspect you're either autistic or a lawyer being obstinate. Human society is full of unwritten expectations, we learn these quickly as a child or face social consequences. No where in the law is it written that you must say 'please' and 'thank you' bu…

https://web.archive.org/web/20090717023402/https://zedshaw.c... The answer you're looking for this guy wrote up 10+ years ago: If you don't like the way people are using your work, release your next work under a different license that more closely matches what you want. Learn from the mistake & don't make it again. Maybe I'm autistic (the diagnostic criteria are very fuzzy around the edges) but I'm not sure what that…

We are still humans with values. I, and I guess you too, don't want to live in a world where everyone just does their bare minimum to fulfill the law.

The fair usage principle can create much more value than complex and often unnecessary strict regulations.

I guess the author would not have complained if a small company had done what aws did just to stay afloat.

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

#446

Post by gowld » Fri, Oct 16, 2020, 5:55 PM UTC

dheera wrote: post #404

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…

Not only that, but there is no mention of the original author on their press release. All they say is "Amazon launches CloudWatch Synthetics Recorder". https://aws.amazon.com/about-aws/whats-new/2020/10/amazon-cl... I wonder if FOSS licenses can be modified such that if you are claiming in press that you are "launching" something and it is substantially based on something open source you must state the original autho…

That's like the old "BSD License Advertising Clause"

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

#447

Post by garmaine » Fri, Oct 16, 2020, 5:55 PM UTC

nitrogen wrote: post #218

matthewaveryusa wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really don't understand this reasoning of "there's not a license" Take an existing one you like and amend whatever you want to it.

IIRC the GPL, for example, is itself covered by copyright and doesn't permit modification of its own text.

You cannot copyright a license.

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

#448

Post by hanniabu » Fri, Oct 16, 2020, 5:55 PM UTC

rmrfstar wrote: post #385

tnolet wrote: post #331

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Not quite the same behavior, but BigCo's free-riding on FOSS is nothing new. "At Serge’s trial Kevin Marino, his lawyer, flashed two pages of computer code: the original, with its open-source license on top, and a replica, with the open-source license stripped off and replaced by the Goldman Sachs license." [1] [1] https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2013/09/michael-lewis-goldma...

Using open source software is different than selling it and profiting off of it without even contacting the project's maintainers.

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

#449

Post by darkengine » Fri, Oct 16, 2020, 5:55 PM UTC

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.

To my understanding, the GPL does not require acknowledging the original author's contributions any more publicly than the Apache license (used by the project). The Apache license already requires preserving the copyright notice, which AWS did. I think the issue is the author wanted a more public acknowledgement of his work, which is a very fair ask. As far as I know, no license requires this (and, I believe such a license would be GPL-incompatible).

In my view, no license can enforce being a good citizen of the open source community. In the embedded space, I've seen vendors bound by the GPL follow it in letter but not in spirit (ie, delivering unusable code with a ridiculous toolchain), or just straight up ignore it (what are we going to do, sue?). On the flipside, good citizen vendors frequently contribute upstream even when they don't have to.

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

#450

Post by geodel » Fri, Oct 16, 2020, 5:57 PM UTC

Aeolun wrote: post #252

geodel wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If I suggest an idea from a coworker in a meeting as if it was mine, that move would be seen, at the very least, as somewhat rude. It will be lot more rude if your coworker now hit social media berating you for stealing other people's ideas. If just office ideas were this important may be they need to be submitted with process of academic journals with proper attribution. It can't be both ways: "Announcing that tak…

> It will be lot more rude if your coworker now hit social media berating you for stealing other people's ideas Would it? I’d be inclined to agree with the coworker. The message is not ‘stealing other people’s ideas’, it’s ‘stealing other people’s ideas without acknowledgement’.

> stealing other people’s ideas without acknowledgement’

Huh, I never heard of 'stealing with acknowledgement'. That'd be plain usage.

> I’d be inclined to agree with the coworker.

I'd think that co-worker would be subject of constant derision where people would run every trivial thing by them asking if they had thought it originally.

Edit: To be clear I support directly confronting folks taking ideas often without attribution or taking to higher ups if that is so important. But social shaming means the person better be prepared to live up to much higher public standards than it would be for some interpersonal issue.