“I wish I could have licensed the Id source code releases as BSD” • Hacker News Board

Re: “I wish I could have licensed the Id source code releases as BSD”

#241

Post by fazgl » Tue, Jul 06, 2021, 11:08 AM UTC

PoignardAzur wrote: post #156

I'm very frustrated by some of the answers here and on Twitter. Carmack says: > The GPL virality wound up being a net negative, and more value would have come from BSD. [...] The best aspects of GPL work didn't manifest, but tons of opportunities to just copy-paste-modify were lost due to license concerns. One of the answers on Twitter: > Then what if it's being exploited by big techs and make your work proprietary?…

Carmack explicitly mentions the BSD/GPL question in connection with copilot. He is working on AI now and has an explicit interest in the intellectual property discussions that flared up after copilot.

It's natural that people think he's using his status as a super programmer to lobby for the position that currently benefits him.

I don't see why he would be more qualified to assess the pros/cons of the GPL than the Linux and GCC authors.

Re: “I wish I could have licensed the Id source code releases as BSD”

#242

Post by npteljes » Tue, Jul 06, 2021, 11:10 AM UTC

scrollaway wrote: post #232

npteljes wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This sounds good. How do you imagine getting there? GPL people think that contributing to this ideal is only worth it if you also require all participants to take part in the ideal. Thereby granting that at least the GPL software stays in that ideal world.

It's definitely a tough call. Maybe this is an industry scale problem. The GPL existing hasn't stopped walled gardens from developing, and open source is falling behind in many regards. Maybe the license isn't the correct place to address this. I'm not sure what the solution is, though...

Proprietary is, I think, the "default" way how people always did things. Keeping the recipe secret is one of the moats that help the enterprise stay relevant. So naturally, "it works" and I think it always will. IMO, this is why it's important to keep the open source stuff open. Closed doesn't usually turn into open, so why should open turn into closed? I think the legal system is exactly the place to address this, in fact, I think the governments themselves should drive the development, as it's their own interest to really own their software and hardware stack.

Re: “I wish I could have licensed the Id source code releases as BSD”

#243

Post by yeahforsureman » Tue, Jul 06, 2021, 11:13 AM UTC

yosamino wrote: post #165

epaga wrote: post #48

I'm still bummed out that for years, GPL was the "standard" go-to open source license. So many projects became useless for any commercial projects whatsoever. GPL advocates say it's so that your code isn't exploited by corporations. But I'd say that choosing GPL means it's more important to you that your code "is not exploited by corporations" than that it can be used for good by people with commercial interests. Tho…

>GPL advocates say it's so that your code isn't exploited by corporations. I am not sure which GPL advocates you have spoken to, but I like the GPL, because it puts me center as a user. I can use and copy a programm as I see fit. And if I come to a point where I think something has gone wrong with it or something is missing, then I can modify it myself, or pay someone to help me do that, and I can distribute these mo…

What if that "bad" is insignificant compared to the good produced by that code as part of proprietary software? That scenario is impossible with GPL. Effectively, you're just restricting the business models of your users. It has worked for some projects (Linux above all) but if you're talking about a small project that likely stays small, I don't know if it usually makes much sense.

Also, your convoluted explanation of why permissive licenses should be called "restrictive" is hilarious.

Re: “I wish I could have licensed the Id source code releases as BSD”

#244

Post by fazgl » Tue, Jul 06, 2021, 11:15 AM UTC

rvnx wrote: post #148

malka wrote: post #120

> "but tons of opportunities to just copy-paste-modify were lost due to license concerns". Well, that's the point. GPL is working as intented.

It doesn't solve the issue. GPL people would have taken the BSD code, do a minor change, and force everyone to redistribute the source-code under GPL. Really terrible license.

This occurs very rarely and provokes a loud counter reaction from the BSD people.

Re: “I wish I could have licensed the Id source code releases as BSD”

#245

Post by pjmlp » Tue, Jul 06, 2021, 11:20 AM UTC

saurik wrote: post #89

wsc981 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is no empirical evidence in what he says Didn't Apple remove all GPL-based code from the whole iOS and macOS dev infrastructure at some point due to GPL licensing concerns? I also believe Apple sticked for a very long time to an older version of GCC in the past, due to licensing concerns of newer versions of GCC [0]. That was, until Apple replaced GCC with Clang. And I am not sure if GPL-based code can even b…

1) So, Apple's issue with upgrading to newer versions of various projects--such as gcc but I think also very notably bash--was because of GPL3 in specific; but frankly the reason we need GPL3 is because of companies like Apple: it is a shame that all important code wasn't GPL3 from day one, as it might have prevented a lot of the worst issues we are dealing with currently. (It is actually my understanding that the GP…

Chris Lattner was responsible for starting clang from scratch, driving the Objective-C 2.0 improvements done in preparation for the Swift work that was being started in the background, has Swift attached to his name.

His efforts have taken him to Tesla, Google, SiFive (which recently got some Intel love).

I guess he has been sufficiently compensated by his efforts.

Re: “I wish I could have licensed the Id source code releases as BSD”

#246

Post by wernsey » Tue, Jul 06, 2021, 11:21 AM UTC

oliwarner wrote: post #137

epaga wrote: post #48

I'm still bummed out that for years, GPL was the "standard" go-to open source license. So many projects became useless for any commercial projects whatsoever. GPL advocates say it's so that your code isn't exploited by corporations. But I'd say that choosing GPL means it's more important to you that your code "is not exploited by corporations" than that it can be used for good by people with commercial interests. Tho…

Id engines —as well as many other projects— were dual licensed, GPL or Proprietary. If you wanted to make a game with one, it either had to be GPL too, or you paid for a traditional licence. This got Id paid and let modders and the open source gaming community go wild. What's the downside? Carmack's argument about perception, but his view is really about having had more people use his software. I think he's wrong. Br…

> Id wouldn't have open sourced a second engine if the first was freely taken by a dozen companies and sold in competition with for game sales, giving no source improvements back.

I don't agree with this statement, because they used to open source their engines a generation behind their current one.

They released the Doom source when Quake was state of the art, so I doubt having another company release a Doom clone in the era of Quake would've put them at a significant disadvantage.

But it is a moot point anyway. That hypothetical other company could've taken the GPL engine and created a game that competed with their games. All that would've been required of them is to make their modified source code available (assuming they even modified the source - their new game might as well have been the stock QUAKE.EXE with a proprietary .PAK and it would've been totally acceptable).

But in order to compete against them that game would've actually had to be good: It would have to have good graphics assets created from scratch along with good gameplay. Not to mention strong marketing given the strength of the Id brand.

What I'm saying is that I don't think the GPL protected Id from their competition from using their open-sourced code against them.

Re: “I wish I could have licensed the Id source code releases as BSD”

#247

Post by benhurmarcel » Tue, Jul 06, 2021, 11:21 AM UTC

CyberRabbi wrote: post #77

epaga wrote: post #48

I'm still bummed out that for years, GPL was the "standard" go-to open source license. So many projects became useless for any commercial projects whatsoever. GPL advocates say it's so that your code isn't exploited by corporations. But I'd say that choosing GPL means it's more important to you that your code "is not exploited by corporations" than that it can be used for good by people with commercial interests. Tho…

Why do people feel entitled to GPL-licensed work? If you are producing code for a commercial purpose then you have the resources to pay for the code to be written. Just because GPL code is in the open does not mean it’s wasted if companies can’t use it for their own profit.

If you make a cake and smash it on the floor, I can call it a waste without feeling entitled to get some.

Re: “I wish I could have licensed the Id source code releases as BSD”

#248

Post by pjmlp » Tue, Jul 06, 2021, 11:22 AM UTC

stavros wrote: post #152

hankman86 wrote: post #149

Let’s face it: the GPL is becoming irrelevant and is displaced by permissive licenses. Projects using the GPL are increasingly held back and are losing favour among developers. Like LLVM is a very active and innovative platform, whereas GCC is essentially stuck in its original scope. Why? Because the world is more complicated than the FSF ideologues want it to be. Developers do not collectively or exclusively want to…

> the GPL is becoming irrelevant and is displaced by permissive licenses Is it really? I've recently switched to AGPL because I specifically don't want you using my stuff if you aren't going to give back. If you want to make money off something, feel free to pay for the initial investment, instead of using my work for free. > Developers do not collectively or exclusively want to work for free and live a life of pover…

Yes it is, on IoT space, the POSIX clones competition is heating up, none of them use GPL.

Re: “I wish I could have licensed the Id source code releases as BSD”

#249

Post by benhurmarcel » Tue, Jul 06, 2021, 11:27 AM UTC

malka wrote: post #226

PoignardAzur wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see how. Working as intended would be "And then the gamedev landscape is dominated by open-source tools because you can't make closed-source tools in-house without giving up on the ecosystem." This is very much not the case today, the market is dominated by closed-source engines (sorry Godot). Seeing as that scenario didn't come to pass, the only result is a net loss of games that could have been made (or mad…

I m sure it is a net loss for people who could have benefited from free work indeed.

> for people who could have benefited

Users?

Re: “I wish I could have licensed the Id source code releases as BSD”

#250

Post by elevader » Tue, Jul 06, 2021, 11:37 AM UTC

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #230

elevader wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd guess that most simply don't care as this is really just an issue for the company, not the author. If the project is licensed with MIT/BSD it still isn't really likely that the company will contribute/donate/whatever. So I'd argue that companies not wanting to negotiate doesn't really change anything for >90% of OS projects, they would not gain anything with a more permissive license either.

Companies certainly are to blame, but most OSS projects need support and I want to support them, but they make it impossible. Why do you want to negotiate? Large corps are burocracies. I can only get mine to donate to a registered charity, is your project one? To pay a bill is easier. There are few people that have authority to negotiate and their time is expensive. If they spend two hours to "negotiate", they are ch…

Sorry, that might have been a bad choice of words on my part (not a native speaker). I agree that this process would be simple and easy in an ideal world but we can't reasonably expect every developer to think about price structures for their small OSS projects. So this will most likely involve at least some sort of talking between both parties. Ultimately the company plans to make mony off of the OSS project, surely those two hours won't make the whole business case invalid.