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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

#571

Post by hoopleheaded »

ketzo wrote: post #554
new_realist wrote: post #501

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Patents and copyright are the parallels in other industries, although they compensate inventors more. Eventually it all goes into the public domain.

But GE isn't paying engineers to put out new lightbulb filament designs to the public (and other companies). Facebook, Amazon, Microsoft, and many, many other companies are literally building tools for their competitors. That's so outside the realm of possibility in any other industry that a copyright lawyer (or executive) in any heavily-patented field would laugh you out of their office for suggesting something like…

This happens all the time across all sorts of industries. Where do you think things like ASTM standards come from? Companies pay people to participate in developing open standards that benefit themselves as well as their competitors.

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

#572

Post by medium_burrito »

thelittlenag wrote: post #556
drevil-v2 wrote: post #535

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that is an unfair comparison. Being articulate does not does not imply any other quality than just being articulate. Back in the day I thought Obama was amazing. He was articulate and considered in his manner of speech. Then we hearing about the drone strikes with heavy collateral damage. And then Snowden came out and told us how Obama administration had put in place all the necessary infrastructure for a sur…

> Obama administration had put in place all the necessary infrastructure for a surveillance state I do not think that is accurate. The Obama administration sustained the growth from the previous administration. I do wish they had curtailed this growth, but c'est la vie.

That's not the whole picture- the giant surveillance program was never going to be killed.

Just give it different names each time congress finds out- Total Information Awareness, Carnivore (slightly different system, head of same hydra), etc.

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

#573

Post by [deleted] »

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…

[deleted]

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

#574

Post by BeetleB »

toolz wrote: post #151
thatguyagain wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are people really expecting the devs at AWS to give a "thank you" to every third party developer out there who's code they use? This is just ridiculous. When does this become an obligation? Is there an unwritten rule of how large/successful a team has to be before they need to give thank's like this?

If someone gave you tens of thousands of dollars of valuables would you say thank you? If people gave that to you regularly would you become too bothered to say thank you? especially when your acknowledgement could help the person giving you their wealth?

In communication circles, people differentiate between requests and demands. The key differentiator: Turning down a request does not lead to anything negative. In particular, the requestor is not displeased or upset. If he/she is, then it was likely a demand disguised as a request.

On the other hand, fulfilling a request can, and often will, lead to a positive. It's still a request.

If you're going to be upset about it, don't phrase it as a request. A big chunk of the population will be annoyed by it.

Soapbox aside, getting to your comment: If someone is giving me that money unsolicited, I may or may not give a thank you. Context is extremely relevant. I did not give a "Thank you" to the recent stimulus check, for example. And I've definitely had fights with people voluntarily giving me stuff over and over and complaining about my not saying "thank you" (or even worse, not reciprocating). I've had to forbid them from giving me gifts in the future. I'm not saying my attitude is the norm, but it is "one of the norms".

The book Influence covers this topic in a lot of detail, and this is commonly discussed in Negotiations books. The bottom line: Be wary of gifts, and either reject if you suspect reciprocation is desired (which could mean "Thank you"), or make the understanding explicit and keep the reciprocity in mind. Of course, this goes at odds with several cultures.

As much as we like to talk about "open source" culture, it doesn't exist. It gets argued to death every time it comes up, which is a good sign it doesn't exist. A big chunk of the SW world, if not the majority, do not feel a need to reciprocate - even with a thank you. (Most of that chunk are OK giving a "Thank you", and this is not a contradiction).

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

#575

Post by notatoad »

wang_li wrote: post #363
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…

It seems like you're arguing that people should get both the good will of having an open source license and the profits of a closed source license. Which comes across as disingenuous.

not just the profits of a closed-source licence, but far beyond the profits of a closed-source licence. an amazon developer salary is well into the six figures annually, for presumably multiple years, which is easily more in one year than it would cost to outright acquire this product.

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

#576

Post by dragonwriter »

arminiusreturns wrote: post #559
munk-a wrote: post #497

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had several discussions with fellow students in Uni about GPL vs. BSD licensing and BSD licensed code is, IMO, more free and more accessible - it really depends on what you want out of your code. Is your goal to provide a useful tool as a one-off that anyone can pick up and use? Then BSD is for you - otherwise, if you have expectations around self-maintenance of the code by consumers then you want to lean more towa…

GPL is about freedom for the user, BSD/MIT is about freedom for the devs. Not all users are devs, but all devs are users. GPL is the better license for net freedom. It baffles me how many people fail to understand this.

> GPL is about freedom for the user, BSD/MIT is about freedom for the devs.

Both are about freedom that is only directly meaningful for developers or people that can employ developers on their behalf; permissive license are about simply providing that freedom rather directly, with limitations that tend to be focussed mainly on avoiding unexpected costs to the original provider of the software (liability, reputational, or otherwise). Copyleft licenses compromise direct provision of freedom to acheive broader but less direct social goals which relate to that freedom.

If you both agree with the goal and agree with the pragmatic judgement involved in the design of the detailed mechanics in a particular license about how to acheived that goal, its quite possible that a copyleft license is better for your interest.

Personally, whether the goal is (and these are two very different goals I've seen cited by GPL proponents) promoting development of free software or inhibiting development of nonfree software, I'm not sure the GPL family (or any other copyleft license) does that better, in practice, than permissive licenses.

The GPL is better at inhibiting nonfree direct descendants of a particular code base, but I don't generally see that as a valuable goal.

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

#577

Post by cacois »

kortilla wrote: post #567
ketzo wrote: post #551

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a difference between what is legally required and the greater good. Obviously, no one involved in this post is guilty of any literal crime. As you're suggesting, the license is the license. But OSS is a fragile and wonderful thing, and an entity with the resources and clout of AWS would (at least in my opinion) do well to tend that garden rather than strip it bare.

This isn’t “stripping it bare”. Nothing is being taken away from the author nor is anything preventing the author or original contributors from continuing to work. That’s the whole point of the license. You’re putting code out there for others to use however they want . This isn’t even about legal requirement vs intent. If you put up a super permissive license, you are making the intent very clear that people can do…

Think of it this way - often when people become extremely wealthy, they turn to philanthropy. Because they want to give back. If someone becomes ridiculously wealthy and gives nothing back, we as a society tend to think poorly of them. Why? Because they are extremely fortunate and highly successful - and they could so easily help others without any negative impact to themselves. That ease makes us unhappy with them _not_ giving back. Because in their particular circumstance, we generally consider it _right_ to use their resources help others. Not required, but right.

Same thing with a company like Amazon. They are enormously wealthy. So we look poorly on them when they don't give back to those bringing them even more wealth. Because they easily could. Because it wouldn't hurt them at all. Because it is right.

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

#578

Post by a1369209993 »

branon wrote: post #427
tunesmith wrote: post #390

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting, how would you define ethically different than morally?

It was my impression that morality regards the beliefs of one person/entity (here, Amazon) while ethics refers to a different/opposing group. So clearly Amazon has no moral scruples about doing what they did, but to us (or others) it's ethically ambiguous.

Well, disagreeing about which words to use doesn't necessarily mean there's any disagreement about the object-level situation, but FWIW, the definition I've generally heard is that "ethics" refers to the whole general "ought" side of the is-ought distinction, which is further divided into: axiology, which outcomes are actually desireable in the first place; morality, what actions and strategies people ought to follow to achieve those outcomes; and law (not, unfortunately, to be confused with actual law), how groups of people ought to act in order to deal with coordination problems and evil people.

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

#579

Post by ghaff »

pbhjpbhj wrote: post #460
ghaff wrote: post #436

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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."

Don't CC-NC licenses count?

No. They're not OSI-approved licenses.

It may also be worth noting that Creative Commons put a lot of effort into trying to define noncommercial over time and wasn't able to come up with a satisfactory answer. Obviously there are cases that are clearly commercial but many others are far less clear. This was being debated over a decade ago and nothing has really changed: https://www.cnet.com/news/does-the-noncommercial-creative-co...

(A legit question. Have an upvote.)

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

#580

Post by ncmncm »

sslayer wrote: post #357
cacois wrote: post #336

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I honestly think there's room for more than gratitude with, as you said, a trillion dollar company. I know its hard to find a balance when we want free and open tools, developed in a spirit of sharing and enabling innovation. But something feels slimy about an enormous company deriving a huge amount of revenue from a FOSS project, when they could easily compensate developer(s) with barely an impact to their bottom li…

I think the legal aspect of the licensing determines what is "right", otherwise the definition of "right" can be interpreted different ways. Don't be fooled, both parties entered into a contract. One when they published the software, and one when they used the software. Any expectations outside of that are left undocumented.

A license is not a contract. Using and distributing Free Software is not entering into a contract.

You certainly can have a contract around a license, but that is a whole other topic.

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